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282 Comments
- ccfccp, on 03/11/2009, -3/+53Extremist? What happened to just being ***** crazy?
- pathouston22, on 03/11/2009, -22/+71Man, if only Germany had a firearms ownership license, where you needed a license just to BUY a gun!
Oh wait, they do.
No law will ever stop somebody who is intent on making harm. - cyberdork, on 03/11/2009, -2/+44Gun ownership in Germany: After the war any gun ownership was prohibited by the allied forces. Even policemen were not allowed to carry guns in the early years after the war. In 1956 private gun ownership was legalized but heavily restricted. You basically can only get a license if you are a hunter (that's usually some old guys in their 50s who go on an organized hunt once a year) or if you are in a sports shooting club (and I think then you can only get dedicated sport rifles). Getting a license for private protection is very rare.
I am a 35 year old German and in my entire live I never met anyone who owned a gun. - cyberdork, on 03/11/2009, -4/+44Latest news (12:45 GMT): 17 year old gunman Tim Kretschmer shot 9 pupils and 3 teachers in his former highschool, then left the school and shot an employee of a nearby hospital on the street. He hijacked a car, let the driver go and drove 40km to Wendlingen where he got in a shootout with the police in or close to a supermarket. During the shootout 2 bystanders were killed and 2 policemen were injured. Finally the police shot him. So it's 16 dead and an unknown number of injured victims.
- ZimbuTheMonkey, on 03/11/2009, -4/+37The motive was that he was a ***** nutjob.
- lead2thehead, on 03/11/2009, -11/+42Yeah... apparently violent criminals aren't deterred by gun laws. Who would have guessed?
- broncfan23, on 03/11/2009, -3/+34His parents owned 18 guns legally. It is very hard to get guns over here. Sad that stuff like this happens. If the parents had that many weapons, maybe they should learn to lock their stuff up. Obviously the kid had some problems. What will come out of this? more restrictions? That doesn't mean that this stuff wouldn't happen again.
- muleskinner, on 03/11/2009, -8/+37Damn, thats terrible.
Germany should impose much more strict anti-gun laws to keep criminals like this guy from getting a hold of such weapons.....oh wait.. - cyberdork, on 03/11/2009, -5/+31"Every country should update their laws and punish the extremist before they harm public"
What extremist are you talking about? This was a 17 year old teenager. - UnpossibIe, on 03/11/2009, -3/+24I'm going to school in the ghetto, where it's safe!
- inactive, on 03/11/2009, -2/+20when you decide to snap, kill yourself first to get warmed up
- gsthomas606, on 03/11/2009, -4/+22See Also: http://digg.com/world_news/At_Least_10_Dead_in_Ala ...
Now begin an analytical, well reasoned debate on the occurrence of gun crimes in countries with varying degrees of gun control.
And by that I mean flame war. Also, this is really sad. - inactive, on 03/11/2009, -3/+20He was bullied regularly at school by jocks, girls sporadically joined in on the laughter adding further embarrassment, he may have had a crush on one girl but he thought she would not give him a chance cause he was "weak" due to the bullying. This hurt his self esteem greatly, the boy enters a depression and finds out life is not worth living anymore so he decides to end his life but not before killing those who contributed to his problem.
He doesn't have to be crazy to commit such acts, push a man to a corner long enough and sooner or later he will snap. Then again all I wrote is mere speculation, I just hope his targets were not randomly chosen, he didn't kill the driver of the car he stole... something to think about. - anarcurt, on 03/11/2009, -18/+34Germany has some of the most restrictive gun laws in the world. Another example that gun laws do not prevent gun violence.
- Llanowar, on 03/11/2009, -1/+17And how are you about to do that?
How can you know who is an extremist?
How can you tell which person will harm the public.
In most cases you can't. So, unfortunatly, you have no choice but to punish them after their crime. - cyberdork, on 03/11/2009, -3/+19Maybe. We can only speculate right now. But of course, like in every country money can buy you anything, also in Germany.
It will be interesting to see if the family owned those guns legally, because then there will be a push to further restrict gun laws and close loopholes. - lead2thehead, on 03/11/2009, -4/+18You seem to have forgotten that the number of robberies, rapes, and home invasions went through the roof after that gun ban went into effect because criminals knew that they could safely break into your home without getting hurt. A gun ban has nothing to do with preventing crime. It's about gun phobia.
- inactive, on 03/11/2009, -4/+17And I'm sure all of them will be really careful and not leave it in obvious places where kids can grab it and 'act tha foo'.
- zirconx, on 03/11/2009, -5/+18Like DC & New York? (states that have some of the strictest gun control laws and yet have some of the highest crime rates)
Or do you mean places like florida and arizona? (states with the largest number of concealed carry permits yet some of the lowest crime rates)
You can't really compare the countries, they are just two different. Guns are much much more prevailent in the US. "banning" them would still leave millions of them on the streets (in the hands of the wrong people). In other counties where firearms have not been so prevailent, it is possible to ban them and have most of them off the streets.
But then criminals just move on to another "tool". Sure gun crime is low in places like Germany but the assault rate is the same. knife crimes are way up. - lizard450, on 03/11/2009, -2/+14You're a moron. How exactly are we suppose to punish criminals before they commit a crime.
- stubear, on 03/11/2009, -4/+16Oh, no, 70 miles away from the epicenter of the greatest gun battle in German history. You'd better take your flak vets along, and watch for IEDs.
- tavallai, on 03/11/2009, -2/+13About 15 helpings of CRAZY.
- inactive, on 03/11/2009, -4/+15Yes, I thought that Germany did have very strict gun control laws. In the Guardian report, it mentions that the father of the guy was a wealthy business man; would that have anything to do with it?
- inactive, on 03/11/2009, -21/+32Holy *****, this is about 70 miles from where I go on a German exchange with my college next week.
"The paper reported that his parents had 18 weapons in their house"
Yeah, I guess he had all of those weapons for "protection". I suppose gun control laws only prevent lawful citizens from getting guns, except when those lawful citizens turn out to be mass murderers.
I think a major cause of these shootings is the media attention, dying in a blaze of glory. If the media was forced to keep them anonymous, it wouldn't glorify the bastards nearly as much. - YouRookies, on 03/11/2009, -9/+18Wussies like these need to just hang themselves. Why take the lives of other people....
- Shiftgood, on 03/11/2009, -3/+11You're argument is that laws dont limit the probability to 0.
Does that mean we shouldnt take the probability from 3 down to 0.5 if we can? - mojoel, on 03/11/2009, -2/+10People like this guy want to feel important before they die. Like they've made an impact. Negative attention is sometimes more important to people than no attention at all.
- dystra, on 03/11/2009, -9/+17With Germanys strict gun laws there are still shootings.
Expect what little gun ownership rights you had to further deteriorate because of this. - inactive, on 03/11/2009, -1/+9The dude shot at cops. I'm pretty sure someone in the school having a gun wouldn't have changed his mind. Less casualties maybe, but if you're crazy enough to do it, no deterrent in the world will stop you.
Although, at least an SRO or something of the sort on campuses that are armed is a good idea. I just doubt it would have helped this situation at all. If someone's nuts, they're nuts. - Kazakaz, on 03/11/2009, -2/+9Haven't you seen Minority Report? You just read the wooden balls.
- lead2thehead, on 03/11/2009, -2/+9It's called sarcasm, genius.
- lead2thehead, on 03/11/2009, -2/+9In America we DO have that right. I'm sorry you have a gun phobia, but that's your problem.
- inactive, on 03/11/2009, -2/+9Being bullied and girls laughing at you is what just about every teenager experiences, it is called growing up.
The guy was a deranged puss who chose to take things out with a gun instead of stand up for himself with his fists. - lead2thehead, on 03/11/2009, -10/+17Didn't he read the rules? NO GUNS ALLOWED ON SCHOOL PROPERTY!
- kernel16, on 03/11/2009, -0/+7His parents owned 18 legal guns, those were the result of legal guns.
- SteelProboscis, on 03/11/2009, -4/+11I guess you missed the articles about the scourge of knife violence in Jolly Old. Oh yeah, they tried to ban pointy knives after that...that makes a lot of sense to me.
- mcvetyty, on 03/11/2009, -1/+816>9
- mamboboy, on 03/11/2009, -3/+10marilyn manson
- rizzo2008, on 03/11/2009, -1/+7@cyberdork
closing legal loopholes doesn't stop smuggling...granted these weapons could have been legal there are probably plenty more that aren't - Shiftgood, on 03/11/2009, -7/+13well executed counter argument.
The homicide rate for the US is 2.97
The homicide rate for Germany is 0.46
Both statistics are for gun related homicides. - oxdeltaxo, on 03/11/2009, -3/+9Videogames.....
/s - rizzo2008, on 03/11/2009, -2/+7***** there are hundreds of "crimes" with firearms each year and these crimes have actually INCREASED since the laws went into place
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKdBxpKqUvs - honeymustardn, on 03/11/2009, -1/+6I think you typed in the wrong website buddy.
- n1eb, on 03/11/2009, -3/+8Good thing I live in the USA and we have a Constitution that guarantees us the right to keep and bear arms and the politicians can never take that away from us...oh wait...
- PowderedToasty, on 03/11/2009, -1/+6What are you talking about? How do you punish someone who's already been shot to death?
- pathouston22, on 03/11/2009, -1/+6Oh yeah, because all the guns will just dissapear from society if we banned guns.
- cyberdork, on 03/11/2009, -4/+9Yeah, because this guy today definitely thought he wouldn't get shot because nobody owns guns....
Shootings like the one today are also called 'extended suicides' because the gunman planned to die anyways and just wanted to take some people with him.
I wonder how many killing sprees we would have per week if anyone owned 18 guns... - mrdecember, on 03/11/2009, -0/+5You're being sarcastic, right?
- inactive, on 03/11/2009, -1/+6My problem with gun control advocates is I would respect them more if they just knew what the ***** they were talking about.
The average so-called "assault rifle" is the same caliber weapon and can shoot at the same rate as many standard hunting rifles, but because it has a "scary" looking plastic shell with a scope or whatever optional attachments, people get ideas in their head it is a high-end military weapon that is magically more powerful or kills more people.
There have also been very few instances of semi-automatics being converted to automatics, it is too difficult for the average criminal and they instead will just choose to get a fully auto off the black market negating gun laws in the first place. - Akairenn, on 03/11/2009, -3/+8I'll sign on for that, as soon as ownership of cars and kitchen knives is also as heavily regulated.
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