US gun culture is 'corrupting the world'

MELBOURNE, Australia -- Furious at the killing of an Australian college baseball player in Oklahoma, a senior figure in the victim's home country blamed the "gun culture" of United States for the death, saying it was "corrupting the world."
"The U.S. has chosen the pathway of illogical policy with regard to guns," Australia's former deputy prime minister Tim Fischer said Friday. "They cannot expect not to have any criticism of it worldwide."
"I am angry because it is corrupting the world, this gun culture of the United States."
His remarks came as the family of slain catcher Christopher Lane struggled to understand why three teens killed him, apparently telling cops they were bored.
"He was a kid on the cusp of making his life," the victim's father, Peter, told The Age newspaper in Melbourne. "He gave up a lot to follow his dreams. There's not going to be any good come out of this because it was just so senseless."
Lane, 22, had left Melbourne to attend East Central University in Ada, Oklahoma, where he was on a baseball scholarship.
Fischer said the lack of gun control in the U.S. had led to a massacre "each and every year since 1996" - in contrast to Australia, which has restrictions on firearms ownership.
He said the majority of illegally obtained guns used in crimes in Australia and Mexico had come from the U.S.
He added that he was not against guns, and kept weapons at his rural home, but added: "I am in favor of firearms sensible regulations to have the best of both worlds.

Three teenagers have been charged in what some are calling the "thrill killing" of a college baseball star after one of the suspects told officials "we were bored. We had nothing to do. We decided we'd kill somebody."
"Anybody can tomorrow go to a gun show in Oklahoma or California and buy a gun without a simple background check. That is illogical."
He also said Australians should "think twice" before visiting the U.S.
"I'm not using the word boycott but I do say Australians should think twice and take into acct the risk of going to the USA in the circumstances that unfold there," saying visitors would be "15 times more likely to be shot dead than if they stayed in Australia, per capita."
In a statement on an a website set up to raise money for the funeral, Lane's family said they were "touched" by the donations, which by Friday morning had rocketed past the $15,000 target - topping $123,000.
"We are so grateful for everyone's generosity and truly touched by the support we have received," they said in a statement posted on the site. "We are blessed now be able to give Chris the farewell he deserves."
Michael Veal, who played alongside Lane on the East Central University's baseball team, set up the fund Monday to help pay for his friend's family to fly from Australia and receive his body, before taking it back home to be buried.
"Every cent is greatly appreciated and all donations will go right to his family! I recently spoke to Chris's father and he told me that if there is any money left over they will start a Christopher Lane Foundation," he wrote.

Lane's body was expected to be flown back to Australia later Friday.
His American girlfriend, Sarah Harper, 22, told NBC News his killing was "the most shocking thing I've ever experienced."
James Francis Edwards Jr., 15, and Chancey Allen Luna, 16, were charged with first-degree murder Tuesday. Michael Dewayne Jones, 17, was charged with being an accessory to murder after the fact and with firing a weapon.
All were charged as adults, according to the Stephens County District Attorney's Office.
One of three teens charged in the attack told police that they shot Lane because they "were bored" and decided to kill somebody.
In a chilling seven-minute 911 recording released Wednesday by prosecutors, the caller who reported the killing can be heard resisting the panic, while pleading for help.
The woman who identified herself as Joyce Smith, reported to the dispatcher that she did not know the gunshot victim.
"He was standing in the roadway and he fell over, and as I come by, he just fell over in the ditch," she said.

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I...I just don't know what to say to this. It's infuriating. I'm embarrassed for this man. And I'm embarrassed for his country.

The homicide rate in the United States 4.7 murders per 100,000. Or, .0047%. In addition, homicide is tied with Parkinson's Disease for deaths in the United States. You are more likely to kill yourself than kill someone else; suicide is the 11th most common cause of death in the United States, while homicide is 15th. To say that America is incredibly unsafe and that Australia should boycott our country because they cannot tour the nation without being in fear of being murdered is absolutely ridiculous. Australia may have a lower murder rate than the U.S., but I can assure you we are no Somalia or Syria in terms of how many of our citizens are killed by each other. For goodness sake.

Furthermore, these three boys were bored. They killed this man because they felt like it. Criminals kill for a variety of reasons because they're CRIMINALS. People who buy guns at gun shows should not be lumped into the same category as criminals, nor should regular citizens with permits to use and carry guns in public. Criminals will come into possession of guns regardless of how strict our gun laws are; again, I say that they're CRIMINALS. They intend to do harm, and they will use guns to do harm. Is that not clear?

Look at prohibition of alcohol in the United States. Once alcohol was illegal, did all consumption of alcohol disappear? Of course not. Underground markets flourished because of it. No matter how strict the laws were against it, alcohol consumption continued, STAGGERINGLY. Do you really think that restricting gun use and purchasing is going to reduce gun-related crimes?Underground markets would foam at the mouth at the opportunity to sell firearms against U.S. law. Guns will always be available to criminals. Murderers will continue to use guns to murder, whether guns are legal or not.

I understand this man is grieving. But still, to demonize the United States as an unsafe, murder-rampant country is not only irresponsible but untrue. I'm sorry, but if someone truly thinks our country is unsafe, feel free to NOT come here. But do not try to make it seem as if our country is out to kill tourists and innocent lives when it is a small group of criminals who engage in this type of behavior.

My post from your accidental repeat thread:

It's not guns, the gun culture, or the United States that is the problem, it's the people behind the guns that is. I know many extremely responsible gun owners who would never encourage or engage in such selfless acts. One can only agree that the type of people who do this obviously have loose screws, or just don't give a flying hoot about humanity, but I'd like to agree more with the former. With the lack of education and lack of accessibility to healthcare, specifically mental healthcare, in the United States, it comes as no surprise that these vicious crimes are occurring, and occurring at high rates. Obviously these aren't the only solutions to help stop people from using guns incorrectly, but hell, if these types of things were made more available to society, I'm sure we would see a dramatic decrease in the amount of horrid crime occurring, specifically with crime where the culprit uses a weapon such as a gun. Also, what has the world come to that we are resorting to blaming inanimate objects for doing such unscrupulous things?

Gyardosamped said:

My post from your accidental repeat thread:

It's not guns, the gun culture, or the United States that is the problem, it's the people behind the guns that is. I know many extremely responsible gun owners who would never encourage or engage in such selfless acts. One can only agree that the type of people who do this obviously have loose screws, or just don't give a flying hoot about humanity, but I'd like to agree more with the former. With the lack of education and lack of accessibility to healthcare, specifically mental healthcare, in the United States, it comes as no surprise that these vicious crimes are occurring, and occurring at high rates. Obviously these aren't the only solutions to help stop people from using guns incorrectly, but hell, if these types of things were made more available to society, I'm sure we would see a dramatic decrease in the amount of horrid crime occurring, specifically with crime where the culprit uses a weapon such as a gun. Also, what has the world come to that we are resorting to blaming inanimate objects for doing such unscrupulous things?

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I don't disagree with you. It is the people who do these things and cause this pain and suffering, but if we as a society continue to allow these people who are the problem to carry guns, that's a problem. There should at least be some sort of regulation.

Do you really think that restricting gun use and purchasing is going to reduce gun-related crimes?

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Well. Taking my own country as an example (Sweden) there are not a lot of guns at all in regular people's homes. Having a gun is odd and unusual and you have to have a special locker for it and license and lots of stuff like that. People don't have guns. The general mindset is that you don't have a gun. Why would you have a gun? Why would you ever need a gun?

But if guns were suddenly prohibited in the US, I imagine the climate wouldn't change overnight to be more like it is here. For some reason, the mindset in the US seems to be "I have the right to have a gun to defend myself". Against what? ._. if guns weren't as easily obtainable, then there wouldn't be as many guns. I'd like to hope. Would the US really deteriorate into anarchy if gun ownership was restricted more?

The United State - Land of the free. You can own a gun, but even crossing the road can be a crime.

Echoing most of what O07_eleven said. Making guns illegal wouldn't stop all gun crime, however it would stop normal households owning one.

That means no 'accidental' gun deaths, no bored/crazy/unstable people killing people.

And in fact, since you brought up the suicide thing, it would actually lower the suicide rate. Shooting yourself is a sure-fire way to die, any other way is a lot less instantaneous, requires planning and can ultimately fail.

Gotta say I'm with O07 here.

Silais said:

Look at prohibition of alcohol in the United States. Once alcohol was illegal, did all consumption of alcohol disappear? Of course not. Underground markets flourished because of it. No matter how strict the laws were against it, alcohol consumption continued, STAGGERINGLY. Do you really think that restricting gun use and purchasing is going to reduce gun-related crimes?Underground markets would foam at the mouth at the opportunity to sell firearms against U.S. law. Guns will always be available to criminals. Murderers will continue to use guns to murder, whether guns are legal or not.

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I disagree. I believe the amount of owners of guns will stay at exactly the same. But the amount of legal gun owners will drop dramatically.
You're going to get this initial wave of defiance because "'Murrica, land of the free. We should be able to have guns if we choose" And I agree, if you want a gun and submit to a background check, purchase appropriate licensing, equipment and training that certifies you as safe to carry a firearm, by all means.
But the vast majority that don't agree with the new firearm act will keep their guns and they are most definitely the problem. If they don't follow the law, they are criminals and therefore should not have a gun. Do you see how this loops?
Give about 24-36 months and people start getting arrested for having an unlicensed firearm, others will start to realise the seriousness and have their guns registered or try harder to keep it a secret (which fails because they're hardcore gun enthusiasts and love showing off their prize babies).

This should have been done YEARS ago and there wouldn't be this problem.

By having these laws in place, there is a large amount of people who will be refused guns at least for a short while which will save lives, and their children will be less inclined to shoot someone because "they were bored".

Get your **** together America, you wonder why nobody likes you.

I'm more shocked about the teenagers' motivations than the U.S.'s influence on guns, since it doesn't help the idea that teenagers are portrayed as irresponsible monsters when one of them said they were bored and decided to kill someone. Really, it's important for us to keep guns in case of a possible zombie invasion, which is the second most realistic way of how the world will end since zombies are created by undiscovered viruses, as provided by World War Z. Guns are the most effective weapons to use to protect yourself against them, because low-ranged weapons leaves you vulnerable at getting bitten and become a zombie yourself. But then again, this Australia's silly policies we're talking about.

Pinkie-Dawn said:

Really, it's important for us to keep guns in case of a possible zombie invasion, which is the second most realistic way of how the world will end since zombies are created by undiscovered viruses, as provided by World War Z. Guns are the most effective weapons to use to protect yourself against them, because low-ranged weapons leaves you vulnerable at getting bitten and become a zombie yourself. But then again, this Australia's silly policies we're talking about.

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Somebody's been watching "The Walking Dead" too much...

You know... I call horse-&%$# at this claim of yours, because when has anybody ever seen a real zombie outside of horror movies & TV shows?! They. Do not. Exist. Period!

I'm sorry, but those who think the Zombie apocalypse will be real are the only thing that gets me going more than this topic at hand.

Regardless, guns as a whole have a great deal of responsibility, & those who can't uphold it shouldn't even own one. If the person does kill someone with a legally-obtained gun, This really should be put on their arrest record & get put out on the general public for all to see (on the internet, that is...) That way, firearm vendors can check a buyer's criminal record, if applicable, & see if they have a history of instigating any sort of gun violence. If they do have such a history, they're ineligible for purchase of any kind of firearm in the legal standpoint. This is something that all legal gun markets must do, or else they'll face government closure.

Though I understand that it might not stop all the gun violence, this, I'm hoping, will significantly reduce innocent deaths from people wielding firearms obtained legally. After all, I do believe in the saying, "Guns don't kill people. People kill people."

I just want to point out that those of you who believe that because we Americans have the right to bear arms we have a right to kill innocent people, you're dead wrong and you're also technically following a similar mindset to these three kids. At least that's how I see it.

Guns aren't the problem, people are. Regulations I'm okay with so long as they're agreeable (like background checks at gun shows), but I think the bottom line is more people, American and otherwise need to understand:

Right to bear arms =/= right to murder.

I think if more people understood that equation, we'd have less problems.

Lots of strong opinions on both sides here... Guns are dangerous. They give people the ability to kill others much easier than through any other means. If they didn't exist, we would be much safer, because it would take more than just one pull of a trigger to kill us... school shootings wouldn't happen, and there would be far fewer murders, simply because they're less convenient. At the same time, you have to realize that guns do exist, and are so widespread in America that were they to become illegal, we would have a war on our hands trying to take them away. On top of that, you have to consider that yes, we probably could take guns away from our honest citizens, but not from gangs and criminals. This means that us honest folk can no longer defend ourselves (as well) against criminals, which doesn't sound very good to me. It's not such a black and white issue (nothing is), and neither banning guns, nor leaving them be are the right answers. I think it's possible to work toward banning them entirely, and would support that... but in the meantime, the first steps should be to enforce more strict regulation. A compromise.

Ok, let's bacccckkkkkk up

Just going to leave this here, it's comedy, but depicts the American insanity perfectly.

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That depicts the attitude of but only a fraction of most Americans, so I'd appreciate it if we could stop generalizing about three hundred million people.

That being said, this country does have major issues with its gun culture, and violence in general. We look to a 250ish year old amendment to substantiate our individual right to bear arms. There is no mention of said right in said amendement.

gg

District of Columbia VS Heller. I agree with it, but I do think background checks at gun shows and smart-guns are regulations that I think need to be looked into.

I do think a rewording of the constitution is needed to clear up any confusion, though. Unfortunately, when it comes to the prospect of rewriting the U.S. constitution itself, I can't think of a single person on this planet who I'd entrust that kind of responsibility to, including myself.

What about austtalias gun policy it is rediculous how do bikey gang members come into possesion of semi automatics.

I believe guns should be allowed to be bought by anyone without a mental disorder or a criminal past when I say mental disorder I mean as in someone who could have skystafreeneya. Don't know how to spell it and it is possible those "voices" will tell the people to go kill others .

Should Canadians think twice about visiting US because its murder rate is three times as high?

Should Japanese think twice about visiting Australia because its murder rate is three times as high?

I've never heard of anybody killing someone because they picked up a violent attitude in another country.

\/ said:

Should Canadians think twice about visiting US because its murder rate is three times as high?

Should Japanese think twice about visiting Australia because its murder rate is three times as high?

I've never heard of anybody killing someone because they picked up a violent attitude in another country.

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...I'd imagine the point is that you're three times more likely to get killed, not three times more likely to become a murderer.

chuckleslucifer said:

What about austtalias gun policy it is rediculous how do bikey gang members come into possesion of semi automatics.

I believe guns should be allowed to be bought by anyone without a mental disorder or a criminal past when I say mental disorder I mean as in someone who could have skystafreeneya. Don't know how to spell it and it is possible those "voices" will tell the people to go kill others .

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We do have a blackmarket in Australia just the same as every other country. Funny thing too, in the news article I read on this exact subject there was a statistic, that was shockingly high (something like 80% but I can't be sure on the exact number), that said the majority of illegal guns in Australia were being sourced in America.

Schizophrenia :)

And mental disorders are a lot more broad than you might believe. People who suffer Post-traumatic stress legally have a mental disorder but PTS can be as minimal as a concussion, or a fear of flying.
People with more serious conditions aren't the only cause of murder in the world either. Those teenagers are completely sane, not once has any kind of medical condition been mentioned.
I'm willing to put my money on the assumption that less than 20% of all gun-related murders were triggered(lolpun) by some kind of serious mental illness.

Restricting myself just to the whole Australia-America travel safety idea and not to the gun debate itself (which I could write a lot more on), no, of course you're still incredibly unlikely to be killed by guns in America or Australia or most parts of the world. The point was not that you were in so much danger by traveling to the US, but that you're going to a country that (according to the deputy prime minister) is full of people who don't seem willing or able to address their relatively large gun homicide problem.

Basically, he's saying that the problem with America isn't that we've got a gun problem (every country has problems) but that we aren't addressing it.

Plumpyfoof said:

Those teenagers are completely sane, not once has any kind of medical condition been mentioned.

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How the hell is anyone sane if the reason for shooting someone was "We were bored"? That'd be typical violent psychopathic behavior. It's not that they didn't know better, it's because they were psychopaths devoid of empathy. Now that that's out of the way....

I agree with some of the posters that more checks should be in place for buying any kind of firearm. I also believe that people should learn to be more responsible if they have firearms in their homes. Gun related deaths are still too high, whether accidental, or on purpose. More should be done by both the U.S government, and the citizens.

I did see something on the news yesterday about a program being brought in place to make faculty more aware about gun violence in schools, and taking a firm stance to end it and help stop it. It was a huge reality check. If there was something like this to educate children more about firearms, and what to do if they have firearms in their household... that'd be a great start. Educate the children a bit more about it. Give them a huge dosage of a reality check, because most teens, whether in junior high, or high school, only know firearms from TV, movies, and video games.

O07_eleven said:

Let me first just say I'm embarrassed for your country, Silais.
Now: "The U.S. has chosen the pathway of illogical policy with regard to guns," Australia's former deputy prime minister Tim Fischer said Friday. "They cannot expect not to have any criticism of it worldwide."
That is completely true, quite frankly I see America as a country to be full of absolute idiots "Oh yeah it's 'MURICAH, FREEDOMS YO, Including the Freedom to be able to shoot and kill innocent people if you're inclined to do so." Notice I said inclined to do so, obviously you're probably going to prison but if an individual decided that they would risk it, didn't care or just want to shoot people because they're bored then there are actually no substantive measures in America to prevent people from obtaining the most effective killing machines available and carrying out murders and atrocities.

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Most Americans don't live in the Deep South. It's because Australian newspapers don't seem to realize that white Mississippians and Alabamans don't speak for all Americans. Considering that many foreign tourists refuse to visit rural America, I'm surprised they think we all act like stereotypical people from the rural South. Seriously, I wish non-Americans would visit the real America - not just NYC and LA (and they don't even visit the old stuff in the cities!). I'd be more than happy to visit a rural area in Europe.

I am American, and I am from a very liberal area. We don't like people like Dick Cheney who parade their guns around.