Suseonline,

So if you don't personally approve of something it must not be allowed? Before anyone engages in an activity or interest they should be obliged to justify their choices and get State approval?

Many of our migrants have fled countries like that where where governments regularly curtail freedom and rights, and approval and necessary papers may be required for the most basic 'privileges' that Aussies take for granted.

I am pleased you picked up on the need to research violence. Various criminologists and police statistics say the trend is down. What if it is like the US where country areas and greatest majority of urban areas have quite a low crime rate (including gun related), and crime and weapon/gun use is high for cultural groups such as African-Americans, and in low socioeconomic areas?

Regarding the shooting presently in the news, the article linked to below by Brendan O'Neill is quite interesting. It is always good to get a different slant on things.

http://www.spiked-online.com/site/article/13179

OTB,

The biggest problem with illegal guns is that many of them started as legal guns owned by home owners. If a burglar robs a home and steals a weapon, then without doubt the owner should be held responsible. I have seen people with gun safes, and the keys kept above the safe.

Secondly why do you need a gun? Pistols are not for hunting, and certainly don't need to be kept at home. A non automatic rifle with 5 rounds is all that required for hunting.

People go through licensing and training for more than a year to drive a car, guns should be treated similarly.

Onthebeach "So if you don't personally approve of something it must not be allowed? Before anyone engages in an activity or interest they should be obliged to justify their choices and get State approval? "

Is that right? Are you seriously placing gun shooting and ownership in the same basket as other 'activities' or 'interests'?
Oh yeah I can see that .... "Come on little Johnny, after we finish playing with Lego, lets go out and shoot our guns.. I'm in the mood for killing something".

No, shooting should be banned as a 'sport' and so called gun clubs disbanded.
It is not an 'activity', it is a means to kill something or someone...

Sorry Suseonline, but that is uninformed comment.
Very uninformed and quite wrong.
What would we do if a brown snake crawled up our steps.
What if an aged bloke saw thieves bashing his door in armed with machetes?
We do not need a gun?
What if you best mate, dog was run over in real pain and you owed it to him to put him out of his pain.
Do we take up a hammer and bash the cow to death we are about to kill.
Feeling nice about things as women do, and thinking nice thoughts about such as not having guns?
More harm than good comes from such, HIPPYS once put flowers in gun barrels and felt so good about it.
Foolishly forgetting enemy do not even care, protection is a reason some must have guns.

Last night I attended Christmas carols in the public hall of the small country town where we live. About 25 of the local primary school kids sang a number of songs throughout the evening. Their first song was Silent Night. It struck a deep emotional chord. Earlier in the week I had watched the opening scene of the first episode of Saturday Night Live after the shootings. The link is here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CTbhVlHuONo

It was a very moving tribute to the young victims of the Sandy Hook shootings.

As I watched the faces of our local kids I could only think of the deep unbearable sorrow that has befallen the families of the slain. How empty and cold their Christmas will be this year and probably for years to come.

I am not a believer nor the praying type but I found myself offering up a prayer that the leaders in America can find the strength to do what we managed to do in this country and enact laws that will help prevent the incidence of mass shooting that have so blighted that nation.

I know in some quarters in the US Australia's example has been raised.

http://youtu.be/Aclnzv_QD3Q

“Because they actually care about their citizens”. Too right.

I also feel anger about what had happened, the senselessness of the act and the dribble coming from American politicians like Mike Huckabee who is claiming that 'taking God out of schools' caused the tragedy.

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Excuse me while I vent some of that here.

OTB accuses me with; “The only thing you went 'light' on was providing facts and evidence to support your claims.”. My figures came from here;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_firearm-related_death_rate#cite_note-GunPolicy-1

OTB has made no effort to challenge the figures I gave leaving the conclusion that he accepts them. If so he should immediately retract the totally ludicrous and unsubstantiated claim that “Switzerland has the lowest gun-related crime rate of any civilised country”. To leave it stand must either mean he doesn't see Australia as a civilised country or he has no intent in letting facts get in the way of his rhetoric.

This is what Switzerland faces on a constant basis.

“Military weapons have been used in the fatal shootings of two people in western Switzerland since the beginning of the month, news service ATS reports. On November 4th, a man shot his 21-year-old girlfriend with his assault rifle in Saint Léonard, in the south of the country. The alleged murderer, a 23-year-old man, had several previous convictions for threatening behaviour and property damage. A week later, a 37-year-old man died from injuries sustained in a shooting incident at a Geneva shopping centre. Sunday, November 13th, a young woman in Boudry killed a 23-year-old man with a military gun which she had believed to be a toy gun.”
http://www.thelocal.ch/page/view/1844#.UNJrvW_qnN0

Of course OTB's rubbish is understandable if we remember he probably has his head buried deep in a NRA magazine. From the US perspective the Swiss figure would look quite good. Not from an Australian one though.

Next we get sidekick Rawmustard linking to more rubbish. A youtube clip posted late last year titled “English Warning "Our Gun Ban caused 40% jump in Gun Crime" DONT GIVE UP YOUR GUNS!”

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