This author comes from a different planet with a nonsensical definition of violence that covers a good chunk of human interaction and child rearing.. He is entitled to his theories, just as the rest of us are entitled to ignore them..

Gawd, what a lot of twaddle. Hitler and Himmler were vegetarians, but they were certainly not averse to violence.

Throughout history, well meaning people have tried to find a philosophy to prevent war and violence. In the 19th century, theologians identified "The Seven Deadly Sins" as the root of all evil. Eradicate "The Seven Deadly Sins" and everything would be humpty dory. Naturally, they failed.

Come the 20th Century, and people identified "class distinction" and "the profit motive" as the root of all evil. They tried to create classless societies where profit did not exist, and they failed. Rather than admit their failure, they created the world's most efficient forms of totalitarianism, complete with gulags and secret police, thereby becoming a parody of that which they claimed to oppose.

Next came "racism" End racism and all would be well. That failed too because people will always have a preference towards their own kinship groups and you simply can't wish away group hostility.

Now here we go again. This author identifies "violence" as the root of all evil. Just stop being violent and everything will be OK. That is as realistic as saying that world overpopulation can be prevented if only people stopped thinking about sex.

Where does OLO get some of these dingbats?

you write..a good article
except for this line..riddled with error

so i will break..it down...with my perceived remedy..or correction

<<..Violence is social interference..>>

violence..is ANTI_social..attention theft..
thus interference..with our social-interactive perception..as well as affecting..our future social interaction's..

social inter-FEAR-ance..
<<..in the genetically programmed feelings>>

feelings..are a result..of real..[or imagined events]
pre-conditioned..arrived at..after the secondary causal feelings,..pehaps..

or via inheritable..pre-conditioning..of localized emotional quotient..by parental sources/peers..the/times..our/sex or race and as our other external..imposed senses..impose their presence..into our awareness..

[too much time to think]

genes..can only..pre-dispose us to..specific condoning biology..not program physiologically..[physiologically/genetically speaking]..

as opposed to environmental external..events based life events..
occurring..inevitably..outside us..but as perceived/affected..from within

[social/interfered/altered..]
thus programed..into our..<<..thoughts,>>language..perceptions interactions..

inherited..or altered..conscious..or unconscious..
<< sensing and/or behavior..>>..

the behavioral/nature/nurture/tendency..

<<of another organism.>>

ok..thats as good as i..can put it

but i agree..<<..It might be inflicted..by an individual or an institution.>>..intentional or accidentally..consciously/unconsciously

it can only be determined which..via proper testing..via split-Half Reliability:testing..defining..its specific cause..determining..the specific measure..of the events consistency..and its future probability..

indicating..a specific necessitated/deliberated..
conscious need for specific avoidance..or managed self control

educated awareness..of the nessisity
for awareness of our affect..on each other

http://www.celestinevision.com/celestine/forum/viewtopic.php?p=15136#15136

people denying corrupt and fallen natures always come up with the wrong conclusions. Violence is a result of lust, greed and not getting one's own way (all part of the adamic nature). Just look at 'peaceful demonstrations'put on by some 'environmentalist'when they don't get their own way. Some non violent rebellion such as manipulation can be just as destructive as violence.

"In summary, the person who uses violence is not angry; they are terrified. To the inexperienced or fearful eye, of course, this is not apparent. Ending human violence will require us to stop terrorizing our children, giving violent individuals support and safe spaces in which to feel their suppressed fear consciously, and changing institutions, such as the legal system, so that we no longer use fear to try to 'modify' behavior."

A friend of mine was caught in a violent situation, he was angry that five 'gangsters' had robbed him and the patrons of the nightclub that he was attending with his wife.
He was not terrified but when the 'gangsters' ordered everyone to lie down on the floor he decided to act, drew his pistol and shot the five armed assailants dead.

Nowhere does the author touch on real violence.

I read the article in full, which shows, at the least, that I possess endurance.

People make choices. Some people, in terrible situations, struggle to find any solution other than a violent one. Others use violence precisely when they in a position of power over somebody else who is weaker and had fewer defences. If the Law is absent, such people use violence all the more. Because they can get away with it.

Stephanie Jarrett has written exhaustively about violence in Aboriginal communities, usually men over women and children, particularly girl children: her book 'Liberating Aboriginal People from Violence' (2013) deserves a far greater audience, including the author of this opinion-piece.

In early documentation, it is quite common to come across references to Aboriginal men beating their wives to death, so much so that one begins to wonder if such violence was standard in traditional societies.

Fear ? Hell no. Power, and the likelihood of getting away with the most appalling brutality ? Much more likely. A sort of arrogance if anything, the belief that they have the right to do whatever they damn-well like.

Joe
www.firstsources.info

Is Mise.. sorry, but did I read your post right, your friend shot the five gangsters dead? What country was this? I think you may have misheard or misremembered the anecdote...

You read me right.

He shot the five dead, when they told everyone to lay on the floor, that could have been a prelude to them shooting everyone.
He was not going to have his wife placed in such a predicament so he killed them.
Simple as that.

Happened in Port Moresby, New Guinea.

The relationship between inappropriate adult violence and child-rearing methods that deprive a child of all respect for their own feelings and needs has been known and written about extensively since at least the early 20th century.

However, this body of factual knowledge rarely gains much traction in the wider world, because it is too much at odds with the way hierarchical societies are structured. Even the psychology-related professions shun it in favour of behavioural modification methods designed to enable those in power to better manipulate and control the masses.

I share the author's views on how children are conditioned to inappropriate violence through socially sanctioned, violent parenting methods. However, I don't share the author's belief that the system can change - unless some apocalyptic event forces us back to living in non-hierarchical social structures again. The best we can hope to achieve under the current system is to minimise inappropriate violence within our own sphere of influence.

Is Mise

‘He was not going to have his wife placed in such a predicament so he killed them.’

Oh, come on now! The guy wasn’t going to have HIMSELF placed in such a predicament. He would have done the same thing if his wife were nowhere near the scene and few would blame him. Why do men have to use women to justify their violence towards other men?

I don't know what the answer to the increasing violence in our world, but I do know I wouldn't want to live in the violence-riddled country of America.

In a land where gun ownership is considered a religion and a God-given right, the incidence of murder by gun is far higher than countries like ours, where gun laws are tighter.

Is Mise, if what you said is true, I wouldn't want to know your 'friend' in New Guinea who felt the need to wear a gun when taking his wife out to dinner!

It must have been an impressive gun if he took out five men before they got him?
He was the judge, jury and executioner of five men.
I hope he was jailed.

Interference in genetically-derived objects, or in any other objects for that matter, is not violence: a pre-condition for violence is that it is believed to adversely affect another individual.

Violence may be carried out for the purpose of seeking attention, but also for a 1000 other reasons. If you care to dig sufficiently beneath the surface of these reasons, you will always find fear as their basis.

Did the killer of five believe that by shooting he adversely affected those five individuals?

I don't know - does anyone here know? Was he ever asked how he believed his shooting affected those five attackers? He possibly believed that by shooting he in fact brought them relief, saving them from a life of crime and the agony of the eventual remorse - if that was the case, then his action might have been right or it might have been wrong, but he was not violent.

Suseonline, "In a land where gun ownership is considered a religion and a God-given right, the incidence of murder by gun is far higher than countries like ours, where gun laws are tighter"

Your hoplophobia predisposes you to labour under the false belief that inanimate weapons, guns in this case, somehow create a crime wave.

Yet you have been informed time and time again on this forum with links to authoritative sources provided, that gun violence in the US is almost always low socioeconomic black on black in slums, usually involving gangs and drugs.

What does it take, a jack hammer to get it into your head? LOL

You can not "end" violence because violent behaviour is intrinsic to the human condition. As Mao tse Dung once said "All political power grows out of the barrel of a gun."

We live in a paradoxical world where attitudes to violence differ from culture to culture. All cultures recognise that it is socially appropriate behaviour for people to respond to external threats to the State with violence. Every nation has an army. However, cultures differ markedly in their acceptance of internal violence.

Some nations have very violent cultures where men possess a medieval concept of honour and they are expected to react violently to every slight upon their self esteem. Other nations most definitely do not posses such a concept, instead their cultural beliefs centre around the fact that they consider violent people as being utterly stupid because they are not in control of their emotions.

However, even in countries where violent behaviour is frowned upon violence can never be eradicated because some men (and very few women) are genetically predisposed to violent behaviour. This is a fact recognised in western courts where violent offenders can be treated leniently if they admit to the court that they have a mental problem that they have trouble controlling, and that they are serious about seeking treatment for that problem.

The problem for western nations is that we are importing people from violent cultures into our countries. And we are also importing people from races who have a much higher genetic predisposition to violent behaviour than our own. In addition, we are now teaching our young men that violent behaviour is admirable behaviour.

Violent movies where women are usually depicted as sex objects who are strongly attracted to violent men are engineered to appeal to low status young men, the very demographic that is most at risk of emulating the violent on screen behaviour.

Anyone stupid enough to think that the images and messages transmitted by the media have no effect upon human behaviour should remember that the entertainment industry is largely sponsored by the advertising industry which claims the exact opposite.

In summary:

1. I want other people to dislike the things I dislike.
2. I know people dislike violence.
3. If I call the things I dislike 'violence', then perhaps other people will be fooled into disliking them too.

You really need to get a lot better at the pea-and-thimble trick before you can expect something like this to work.

Two good posts above.

OTB, you are easily amused. No sense, no feeling?
I didn't bring race into the subject, you did.

If there were tighter gun laws in the US, no one would find it easy to get their hands on guns of mass destruction, whatever their race.

You are just as dead by gun shot, whomever pulled the trigger...

LEGO, "The problem for western nations is that we are importing people from violent cultures into our countries. And we are also importing people from races who have a much higher genetic predisposition to violent behaviour than our own"

That is very similar to what was said by a retiring commissioner for police (NSW?) around 6 or so years ago, maybe more. He said that we were bringing in people whose tradition it was to solve their disagreements with a weapon, preferably a knife or a gun or failing that, whatever was to hand.

Suseonline, "If there were tighter gun laws in the US, no one would find it easy to get their hands on guns of mass destruction, whatever their race"

Intending offenders will always get the weapons they need, be it petrol, guns, knives or whatever.

The 'tighter gun laws' you speak of only apply to citizens who obey the laws anyhow. They of course aren't into drug trafficking and gangs and don't kill others.

As has already been put to you, the gun violence in the US is black on black - low socioeconomic black on black in slums, usually involving gangs and drugs. They do not get licences and they wouldn't qualify for one anyhow. They do not possess their guns legally. They do not use guns legally. They don't recognise bans or restrictions and they will source guns from somewhere else anyway and imported if necessary. They will manufacture guns if required, or invent more destructive ways to enforce their territory. Too easy.
It is already happening in Australia where OMGs use arson and bombs, and guns are the mild tools in their arsenal.

As a leftie though, you wouldn't want to come down hard on the people who buy the drugs that deliver the windfall profits that attract and resource the criminal gangs, now would you? Because all of those well paid trendies who buy the recreational drugs are the lifeblood of the drug industry. If they stop buying the drugs for their entertainment, there wouldn't be so many thugs manufacturing the stuff and fighting over territory.

anyhow..the thread..seems to/be not going..to plan
but as the topic..ends with..'ending..it'..i..thought it..helpful
from/page33

http://www.divinetruth.com/PDF/People/Other/Jane%20Sherwood%20-%20Post%20Mortem%20Journal.pdf

..<<..One only..I will mention..because his coming..illustrates..a too-common problem...What happens to..the unfortunate-soul..who puts an end to..his own existence?

<<..In many/in most..of such cases..the pressure..of work..and worry, combined/with..private misfortune..have unsettled..the reasoning..of man..[or this is..the would-be charitable..verdict of the Coroner’s Court.]

<<..There are...few men..who have not..in their make-up
that weak-point..at which..self-control..breaks down.

In most/cases..courage..has been sapped..by self-pity..and so..the breach..of moral rectitude..is carried..for..by a flood..of despair.

No man..can judge,..rightly..because..each of/us..has his breaking/point..whether life..tests us..to the limit..or not.

The friend..[departed/spirit]..of whom..I speak..was found almost immediately..and I was able/to..go to him...He was in..a kind of stupor..[state..of bewildered-confusion]..and I..was told..that he might remain..in this state..for a long time..and that nothing could be done..about it.>>..

other books reveal..that/these..folks are fixated..upon their selves..[ergo/ego]..and their own pains..[that]..many..are so..self bound-up..in them-self..they remain attatched..to their dead corpse..for ages..

others feign death..because they dont conceive..life after death..but this is a surety..[energy..*cant be..destroyed]

..anyhow

<<..We watched over him..and were loath..to leave him..in the misty half-region..where he was found...It was a tract..I myself had known in time past.

Until..he regained consciousness..[important point]..there he/had to remain;..had we..forcibly removed him..his poor..[astral]-body..would not have been-able..to stand..the conditions of our plane..and so we had to leave..him there...>>

nothing*..is forced..upon other..in the next realm
its..an unwritten law..[respect*]..let him self deceived..remain deceived.

<<..Now..and again..I went back..to find him..still in
the same..quiet coma,..and seeing..the state of his..astral form..>>

such..trauma..events tear it..to shreds

<<..I almost dreaded..his..eventual awakening...Suicides..often show this..long-lasting coma.>>

see the sleepers
http://new-birth.net/booklet/Gone_West.pdf

<<..It is really..a merciful pause..during which
some of..the damage..to their..*emotional bodies..is quietly made good.>>

note..our astral bodies..[our soul]..are..not like our flesh body..but more like..frozen-water..[or haze/mist..aether]..[that gets stained..by our life experiences..and dulls..the emission,[radiance],of our..life spirit..[within]..

<<>>Much always..remains for them..to do..when they come to themselves..>>

if only..we..could convince..them..
that death..only complicates..things..before they try to escape life's..material-prison

<<..and in..D–s’/case,..Mitchell asked me..to make periodic visits..to him..so that he might find..a familiar face when he awoke>>

anyhow..you no..doudt
have your..doubts..too

read...
http://new-birth.net/booklet/30_years_among_the_dead.PDF

it was written..by your peers
i reveals..simple ways to..fix the issue
[not that..your peers..would fund..that sort..of sure fix]

repeat*..custom..is money
but..if you..want..the cure..cast a wider net;)

Killarney,

Had he not been thinking of his wife he could have opened fire much earlier, but he was content to be robbed but not to have his wife murdered, not all men think of themselves first.

If the mere presence of guns caused violence, Susieonline, then every society with lax gun laws would be violent. That is not the case. The European country with the laxest gun laws is Switzerland, who's homicide rate is one of the lowest in the world.

Similarly, the those parts of Australia where gun ownership is high is in the rural areas of Australia where gun crime is almost non existent. Many country towns in NSW have never had an armed robbery in their entire history. Similarly, most Australian states once had almost non existent gun laws with rates of gun crime much lower than today where gun ownership is very restricted. The state of NSW has now made its gun laws more onerous no less than six times in the last 40 years with the result that gun violence is worse than ever.

In the year 2001, the NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics published a paper entitled "Firearms and Violent Crime in NSW" (issue 57) in which it showed that 55% of the handgun shootings in the entire state of NSW occurred within the boundaries of two of Sydney's most notorious and crime prone ethnic ghettoes.

There is infinitely more evidence to provide a causal link between crime and ethnicity than there is between gun ownership and crime. Yet well meaning humanitarian people like yourself refuse to look at the facts and will always seek to blame guns because discerning a self evident causal link between ethnicity and crime is blasphemy to your humanitarian principles.

Remember Susie, the true test of an intelligent person is the one where they admit, "may the truth be told, though the heavens may fall."

"Is Mise, if what you said is true, I wouldn't want to know your 'friend' in New Guinea who felt the need to wear a gun when taking his wife out to dinner!

It must have been an impressive gun if he took out five men before they got him?
He was the judge, jury and executioner of five men.
I hope he was jailed."

Susie,

Doubting my veracity? Isn't that a form of violence ref. the article?

He felt the need to carry a gun because he was in Port Moresby and he was licenced to carry it.
It turned out that he was right to take it to the night club.

He wasn't gaoled but he did have to leave New Guinea because of 'payback' and the inability of the authorities to protect him and his family.
The gun was a run of the mill pocket pistol, nothing special and they didn't get him at all, he was the 'getter' they were the 'got'.

As an example, the last time that I shot on an Army range the Range Officer made a suggestion "Sir, I think you should use two hands" as I took my position on the firing line with the service issus 9mm Bpowning pistol.
I declined his advice and put 8 shots into a 7.5 inch group on the chest of the figure target.
Timer read 3.23 seconds.

It's not so much the pistol but the ability of the shooter; by the way I'm not very fast.

God forbid, if this country had to go to war, for every one soldier there would be 1000 protestors, and ten times that amount advising on the acceptable way to perform the task.

Is Mise, "I declined his advice and put 8 shots into a 7.5 inch group on the chest of the figure target"

The prevailing political correctness dictates that you should not be shooting at even stylised images of people. Oh and you shouldn't be using bullets. That gun has to go too!

What are you like at nagging the offender into submission? That is the way approved by OLO's hoplophobic whingers, and also modelled by them.

Think about the children.

Is Mise "As an example, the last time that I shot on an Army range the Range Officer made a suggestion "Sir, I think you should use two hands" as I took my position on the firing line with the service issus 9mm Bpowning pistol.
I declined his advice and put 8 shots into a 7.5 inch group on the chest of the figure target."

Am I supposed to be impressed Is Mise, that you put holes in a piece of cardboard?
I'm not...sorry...

Non-violent people don't need guns unless they are in the military in a war zone, or they are law enforcement officers.
Anyone else holding a gun is just a child playing "cowboys and Indians".
Yee hah and giddy up...!

>>Intending offenders will always get the weapons they need, be it petrol, guns, knives or whatever.<<

Because they possess initiative and diligence. Qualities that would-be gun-owners seem to lack.

People who want something badly enough will make their own opportunities to get it, either dodging around the law or just smashing through it.

You can't buy thermite on the open market. You probably can't sell thermite on the open market either. I haven't looked that deeply into it because it's pretty easy to make your own thermite. That's probably illegal too but it's hard to police. If you're just setting it off in your backyard for your own amusement and not using it to destroy property I doubt the police care, and nor should they.

You can buy beer on the open market. But you can't buy reasonably priced beer: the Government imposes a hefty excise on alcohol in addition to normal taxes. If you want to have a beer but not pay through the nose for it then you basically have two options:
a) Nick it. By far the cheapest method but it wouldn't sit well on my conscience.
b) Brew it. More labour intensive and expensive than theft, but far cheaper than buying commercial beer: you only have to pay GST because the government has yet to figure out a way to tax yeast for fermenting. Instead of the guilt of theft or the sour grapes of over-pricing you get a nice warm fuzzy from the feeling of a job well done when you bottle, and the same nice warm fuzzy when you crack the first bottle of a new batch. And you get cheap beer.

Beer isn't hard to make. Neither is thermite. Or black powder. I've never tried my hand at it but I had a mate who used to cast his own lead soldiers... lead soldiers are a lot more intricate than bullets. It might be illegal to buy guns but is it illegal to build them in your back shed?

If the people who claim to want guns so much wanted them as much as the criminals who want incendiary bombs or the Scrooges who want cheap beer then they would to what the criminals and the Scrooges do: knuckle down and learn how to make them for themselves.

Have we really become so soft and Septic and consumerised (or should that be consumed) that even the die-hard patriots - our last line of defence against the Muslim Menace - will throw their hands up in dismay and confusion because they can't buy the latest shiny handgun off the shelf? People were building firearms before they figured out that the earth revolves around the sun: it can't be that hard.

Cheers,

Tony

>>the last time that I shot on an Army range the Range Officer made a suggestion "Sir, I think you should use two hands" as I took my position on the firing line with the service issus 9mm Bpowning pistol.
I declined his advice and put 8 shots into a 7.5 inch group on the chest of the figure target.
Timer read 3.23 seconds.<<

Then I tied an onion to my belt. Which was the style at the time.

Cheers,

Tony

Suseonline, "Anyone else holding a gun is just a child playing "cowboys and Indians". Yee hah and giddy up...!"

That idiotic post is representative of your irrational bigotry.

Do the names Laetisha Scanlan and Catherine Skinner mean anything to you? They created Australian shooting history after winning gold and silver in the women’s trap at the World Cup event in Al-Ain, UAE.

Here is an interview of Laetisha Scanlan, 23-year-old shooter, Gold medalist at the Trap Women Finals in the ISSF Shotgun World Cup 2013. The sort of dedicated, successful sportswoman you label as a cowboy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cyeydTHVUYs

Shooting is one of the few sports and recreations that has an enviable record for welcoming women and the disabled, many of whom have fine records too.

any..corrections..of fact..not post style..appreciated

mind..is split..into..at least.. three.;.levels
that..of the..super-conscious,..conscious..and subconscious mind...
Consciousness..is the form..of awareness..as opposed by ...un-consciousness

the sub-conscious..is the emotive..[fear/hate]..
the remembrance..[as opposed to..the memory]..that recalls..the way..to the means..
to repeat..or avoid..previous..fruits..of action..[of mean..by means]

[doing..this..*last time..made my hunger end]
[doing that..hurt me..that/thing..is..
that/looks like..i am hungry[etc]
the mundane..[sensual]

then..there is the..awareness..[visualization]
noticing..change..[miracle]..on top of that..is revelation..[audible visualizations..[revelatory imaginary]

http://www.lucid-mind-center.com/what-is-consciousness.html

"Consciousness is..the receptive mechanism,..
receiving messages from above..or below;..[from inside..and without]..from the Holy Spirit..or the beast or ego..[id]

Consciousness..has levels..
and awareness..can shift quite dramatically,..but..it cannot transcend..the perceptual realm's

"Revelation..unites you..directly with God.
Miracles unite..you directly with..your brother.
Neither emanates..from consciousness,..but both are experienced there.

Consciousness is..the state..that induces action,
though it..does not..inspire it."
http://www.miracleshome.org/supplements/consciousnessacim_255.htm

The/truth..of who we are..is obscured by..our thoughts
about who.;.we think we are,..based on others..[reactions..to perceptions of us..and our..[projection..of ego's perceptions..of ourselves,

http://abcacim.org/blog/

When..a miracle..is performed..one literally changes the/course of both..space and time,as if..the malady never occurred,..IT.never existed;..one only believed..[believed/perceived]..it did..[in errantly]..for..a short period..*in time.

Allopathic..and holistic practitioners..alike typically/deal consciously..guided..by the super-conscious..with
the external.manipulation of matter..to heal matter.

Some..practitioners manipulate..sub-conscious..via the acupunctural, chakra,..and astral energies...to heal matter...A Course in Miracles teaches..one to heal matter..and ultimately..transcend matter altogether..by literally becoming..at-one with the..infinite field of causal..energy itself.

[supreme..otherness conscious]
[goodly-otherness devotion]..[or god..for short]

All three/levels..of healing
physical,/astral,/and proto-causal..are nevertheless useful and vital,..and can be employed..in unison to treat illness

This is..much more/than just..mind over matter...
super-conscious/Mind..knows not..of fear,..nor..what means sickness,poverty,unhappiness,or death;..for it..is the source..of all love,..health,..abundance,..peace,..and life.

http://www.holisticunited.com/blog/a-course-in-miracles-healing/

Tony Lavas'

It is illegal to make guns at home but all that that law has done is make it extremely hard for the law-abiding to make their own, they now have to jump through many legalistic hoops; criminals, on the other hand, have no such problems and concentrate on the manufacture of sub-machine guns, if newspaper reports of prosecutions are anything to go by. It is worth remembering that the world's best sub-machine gun, the Owen, was a development of the backyard shed work of Australia's Evelyn Owen.

My little example of shooting the Browning pistol was merely to illustrate the speed with which a pistol may be fired accurately, even by one who is not fast.

"Am I supposed to be impressed Is Mise, that you put holes in a piece of cardboard?
I'm not...sorry...

Non-violent people don't need guns unless they are in the military in a war zone, or they are law enforcement officers.
Anyone else holding a gun is just a child playing "cowboys and Indians".
Yee hah and giddy up...!"

You are not supposed to be impressed at all, I was merely illustrating that a person who is not fast with a pistol can still shoot fast.
It was partly to educate you on what can be done with an ordinary pistol.
Have you any idea just how fast an ordinary revolver can be drawn and fired?

Don't you think that my friend in New Guinea had need of his pistol?

Is Mise, I am sorry for being sarcastic.

I do understand that some people love shooting as a sport.
I will always hate guns, for personal reasons.

Using them as a protection against violence obviously would be handy at the time, but I still believe they should not be in the hands of anyone other than police, military, farmers and at shooting ranges.

It is just a vicious cycle in that if someone has a gun, then someone else will want one 'just in case' they need to protect themselves from the first one.
And so it goes on...

I grew up in the 1970's Susieonline, when the presence of fireams on the stret was taken for granted, and crime was very much lower.

People could own handguns for personnel protection if their employment caused them to carry lare amounts of cash or other valuables. Jewellers and gun shop owners were armed, a situation that I believe still applies today. Bank tellers were also armed, and many of them were former soldiers who were more than happy to shoot it out with any stupid would be bank robber. Bookmakers and people carrying payroll cash were also usually armed with concealed handguns. Naturally, armed robbery was much lower than today. It was even lower in the 1950's when armed robbery was a hanging offence.

School cadets could be seen travelling on buses and trains with Lee Enfield military rifles on their shoulders, and nobody batted an eye. My own high school sported a rifle range for Lee Enfild rifles rebarrelled to .22 calibre, and our school armoury had four fully operational Bren Light machine guns. The legal age for owning a firearm was 16 (with parents permission).

The main restriction on carrying guns on public transport was that the bolts had to be removed from the weapon. This did not apply if the rifle was a lever gun or an automatic. Guns could be rented by the day or the week from Mick Smith's gunstore on George Street, Sydney CBD, every department store sold guns, as did many suburban male hairdressers. Ammunition could be purchased from corner stores and country petrol stations.

Sydney's Central Station at holiday time looked like wartime with thousands of city based shooters standing on platforms with slung rifles and kitbags, all ready to head off to their uncles property in the bush.

But there were no massacres and no school shootings. Kids did not kill kids

That was back in the good ol' days Lego, and I believe violent organised crime gangs were rife in Sydney, even back then?

Do you want a mad, violent society like many areas in the US then Lego?
I don't, and luckily the vast majority of Australians don't want that either..
If they did, our gun laws would be changed.

I doubt this Liberal Government will ever overturn the one good thing Howard did...

Sydney Morning Herald for Tuesday, November the 7th, 1995.

Quote:
Businessman shoots 'raskols'

By Lucy Palmer

PORT MORESBY, Monday: A buisenessman has left Papua New Guinea
after he shot dead four armed "raskols" who assaulted diners in a Port Moresby restaurant on Friday night.

Police confirmed that the businessman and long-term resident of Port Moresby, believed to be an Italian, was in Australia and would not be charged over the shooting.
"He's not been charged with anything; we believe he was acting in self defence,and he's justified under the law," a police spokesman said.
....
The killings have shocked the Papua New Guinea capital, although many expatriates and senior govenment officials said their sympathies lay with the man who was having dinner with his pregnant wife.

"This is the first time a large group of armed attackers were given a dose of their own medicine," a spokesman for the Prime Minister, Sir Julius Chan, said.

"The law-abiding citizens, if they have the means, can retaliate with or without the help of law enforcement officers," he said.

Police said the gang burst into the popular Cathay Club at about 10pm on Friday, shooting dead a security guard.

They ordered the diners to lie on the floor and began emptying their pockets. The gang saw a bulge in the trouser pocket of the expatriate businessman and, believing it to be a wallet, ordered him to hand it over.
The man then pulled out a loaded pistol, for which he had a licence, and immediately shot several of the gang.

Two were killed instantly. The bodies of another two were found later outside. Another two suspects, who were also wounded, were in the Port Moresby General Hospital under police guard.
.... A female patron suffered a gun pellet injury to the buttock.

Astralian Associated Press. unquote.

One newspaper report of the incident. He is Australian not Italian and time has possibly dimmed my recollection there were five dead but one was murdered by the criminals and by this account he shot six, killing four; good shooting under stress in anyones book

In Queensland:

- OMG bikies brawl in restaurants before shocked mums, dads and kids;
http://tinyurl.com/bikie-brawl-Gold-Coast

- there are drive-by shootings, arson and other violent criminal behaviour directed by OMG bikies at other clubs over drug territory;

- a policeman was shot in the face; and

- police allege that OMG bikies launder millions of drug money through legitimate businesses as fronts.

However the leader of the Labor opposition, Ms Annastacia Palaszczuk, who was born into a comfortable existence that included completing a Master of Arts abroad (London), has been concerned about the rights of OMG bikies.

But apparently the same Labor leader sees no problem in police keeping the intimate personal details of ordinary, respectable, law-abiding licensed citizens on computer as 'persons of interest', and fully-uniformed police conducting routine, random, compulsory inspections in ordinary, respectable, law-abiding licence-holders' homes, and of course questioning them at the same time. No worry about their rights, obviously. Nothing to be found either.

No worry either that police are monitoring the wrong guys (and gals).

Nonetheless Labor favours more 'gun control', whatever that is. As long as it doesn't upset the tender sensibilities of those nice OMG lads, or the well-known (to the media) criminals who run clubs in Brisbane's Valley district, and other entrepreneurial gangs who exploit drugs and other nasty businesses - gang members that the federal government has been busily importing along with the migrant intake. Best not talk about that. It is all 'Never you mind'.

Best to apply criticism and enforcement where there are no problems. That is at ordinary, licensed, law-abiding citizens. Safer and easier that way.

Suseonline, "It is just a vicious cycle in that if someone has a gun, then someone else will want one 'just in case' they need to protect themselves from the first one"

No, the problem is illegal ownership and use. Regrettably, the millions to be made from drug trafficking attract criminal gangs who use all manner of weapons, including fire accelerants and bombs.

The $million windfalls from drug trafficking corrupt to the top of society, including the judiciary.

The point you have chosen to ignore, Susieonline, is that if your society is becoming more and more violent, then intelligent people should be a lot more interested in what is changing in their society, rather than always blaming something that was always present, and which after forty years of ever stricter controls on has done nothing in terms of altering violent crime rates, other than making things a lot worse. In shooting parlance, that is called "shooting at the wrong target."

Violent crime has always existed and it always will. But what we are interested in is that violent crime rates, especially armed robbery, random acts of senseless violence, and drive by killings, are rising spectacularly. The fastest growing crime statistic in the USA is juvenile homicide. The state of NSW has opened four new prisons in the last twenty years, reopened two ancient closed ones (Berrima and Parramatta) to handle the increasing load of new offenders. And that with novel new punishments like home detention and community service which are programs designed to hold down costs. In addition, people in the past were once jailed for crimes like homosexuality, bigamy and adultery, which today we do not consider to be crimes at all.

Gun laws are simply a litmus paper test of how violent your society has become. Violent societies generally need stringent gun laws while peaceful societies generally do not. There is a far more evidence directly linking ethnicity to crime rates than there is linking guns to crime rates, but people like yourself avert their eyes to the former and always focus entirely upon the latter. The need to appear publically non racist is far more important than thinking objectively.

LEGO, "The fastest growing crime statistic in the USA is juvenile homicide."

Linked to fatherless families - an inevitable conclusion that Foxy et al would choke on for sure, being at odds with their feminism and Statism.

<An American FBI agent who specialises in serial killers has said that most of them come from a dysfunctional family with an absent father. A magistrate I happened to dine with not long ago told me that the overwhelming number of youth offenders he deals with in court come from broken homes and/or fatherless families.

Even researchers who are wary of making a connection between broken families and crime have conceded that some relationship exists between the two. For example, Demo and Acock, who reviewed dozens of studies on the subject, concluded: “A tentative conclusion based on the evidence reviewed here is that antisocial behaviour is less likely to occur in families where two adults are present, whether as biological parents, step-parents, or some combination of biological parents and other adults”.

Strong connections between crime and family breakdown have been made by the Centre for Independent Studies in Sydney, which compared crime rates with out-of-wedlock birth rates from 1903 to 1993. It found that the “percentage of ex-nuptial births correlates significantly with both serious and violent crime at both one and two decades time lapse”.>

http://www.quadrant.org.au/blogs/muehlenberg/2010/02/the-perils-of-fatherlessness

I agree with you 100%, OnTheBeach. Family breakdown is one of the main reasons why our society is getting more violent while at the same time our gun laws are becoming more stringent.

Australia's crime rates began their upward spiral at the end of the 60's decade when a series of events coincided to begin the process of social decay. The first, was the liberalisation of immigration requirements which meant that people from notoriously crime and welfare prone ethnic groups were encouraged to immigrate into Australia.

The second, was the liberalisation of our censorship laws to the point that the media began creating entertainment products openly glamourizing violent criminal behaviour and presenting violent criminals as heroes who's behaviour was worth emulating. Criminal heroes were always handsome, self assured, possessed the most sexy girlfriends, had the coolest lines, the nicest cars, and they led exciting, adventurous lives.

Such violent movies and "rap" songs were engineered to specifically appeal to young, low status, low IQ males, precisely the same demographic that are the ones most likely to get into trouble. And the ones most likely to use the on screen role models behaviour as scripts for their own.

This liberalisation occurred during the time of easy divorce in Australia and in other western countries. Today in Australia one third of all families are single parent, which is a real concern to society when you appreciate that the family is the societies primary socialising instrument.

Fatherless boys, who's only window to the world is a TV set, are bombarded with messages which tell them that taking drugs is OK, violent men are heroes, women are just body parts to be looked at, being in a criminal youth gang is cool, always criticising authority is the mark of intelligence, and picking a up a weapon and killing your enemies is the mark of a Real Man.

Then when a kid does just that and walks into school blowing away his teachers and fellow students, we ask ourselves "How could this happen?". "Why doesn't he know right from wrong?"

Then blame the gun.

Just because young, dark-skinned, Muslim immigrants of low I.Q. and low socio-economic background, living in Sydney, who grew without a father and like "rap" music, are prone to shoot around if they have guns, does not imply that a white, Catholic, Australian-born, intelligent and wealthy old lady who lives in the country-side, likes classical-music and grew up in a loving family, should be prevented from having a gun besides her bed in order to protect herself and feel safe.

That's how far 'political-correctness' divorces people from reality.

Afraid of discrimination? Discrimination includes the ability to distinguish between good and evil - we need more of it!

It takes no "Virtue Derangement Syndrome" to work out why there is violence. Competition for resources dates with the emergence of the Blue-Green algae. By definition there is never enough hence a most basic allocation mechanism is emergent. No competition would have us still playing with rocks and being part of Nature's menu.
We are not on the menu and are groping forward but there is no instruction book. I doubt that Kumbyah is the answer though.

<That's how far 'political-correctness' divorces people from reality.

Afraid of discrimination? Discrimination includes the ability to distinguish between good and evil - we need more of it!
Posted by Yuyutsu, Sunday, 13 October 2013 7:36:25 AM>

Yes, very well said. That and the remainder of your post goes to the heart of it.

The Shadowy outfit that is behind 'gun control'.
I would very much like to know why the publicly-funded national broadcasters, particularly the ABC, are always keen to give a podium to the one or two persons who are behind the gun control site, without recognising the obvious lack of identifying detail on the site, including its membership, links & any disbursement of political donations (eg Greens Watermelon faction, NSW) and source/s of funding.

Who are these people and why do hide, doing the work behind closed doors? Are they moonlighting public servants? The alleged links with the Soros organisation and sponsoring of the persons behind gun control to travel top the US for briefing and activism must be investigated and disclosed.