Check out this Inquirer article:
“A child who does such a thing somehow has received the message that guns are a solution to problems, and that if you’re a ‘good guy’ and you shoot a ‘bad guy,’ then that kind of violence is OK,” Everitt said.
The bearers of that message are not responsible gun owners, he said; it is the avid gun-rights activists who view the victims of such shootings as “scumbags.” These activists oppose all gun control.
“As I am seeing these shootings where children are murdering people in cold blood, I’m beginning to believe that children are picking up on these messages, that there are no repercussions, and that you are doing the right thing to do this,” said Everitt.
Yeah, because murdering your mother is exactly what we advocate. The sick part, though, is that the Inquirer happily prints this type of slander. No wonder they are circling the bowl.
I’ll bet that many of these gun-grabber people like Ladd Everitt are also ones who believe that kids should not be allowed to pray in the public schools, let alone even mention God there.
Who or what do these people think can deliver a stronger “Thou shalt not kill” message to kids – secular atheist school teachers, or the word of God himself?
sad … grabbers don’t know the difference between murder and defence.
After reading that article from a journalism teacher, I can see why the journalism business is in such bad shape these days.
`…and what Everitt called “shoot-first” laws enabling the use of “lethal force whenever they deem there is a threat to their lives.”`
Hoo boy. “They deem” indeed. Implying it is just the individual, not the jury, and oly means a case does not have to be prosecuted even if LEOs and prosecutors agree it was in defence of self or others. Which used to be the way of things, indeed remains so in some places, wasting considerable money and time.
Until yesterday, reading about a proposed law for Toronto, I was not aware that some 35 states found it necessay to have laws that saying “sorry” at the scene of an accident cannot be used as proof of guilt. Lots people will say it, and even mean it, despite not being at fault. Yet a law somehow became necessary to provide what would normally be common sense. Same with “he was coming at me with a knife and I had nowhere to run so I shot him yet I am going to jail for discharging a firearm within city limits” laws.
Hey good thing Ladd Everett, journalism teacher, researched the subject fully by talking to someone from the NRA, or a criminologist, or Howard Nemerov, in order to present a well informed, responsible, and balanced op ed.
Oh wait…
Dock, Ladd is not the journalism teacher. Everitt is a gun control activist quoted in the piece. The author, Steven Hallock, is the one who did not seek any other sources.
Do you want to know where the kids get these ideas about the use of guns. When is the last time you watched one of the offerings from Hollywood where they kill everyone in sight without aiming and their weapons turned in all sorts of ways, no front sight/rear sight lining up, guns pointed at ceilings, feet or just the ground? When was the last time you took a 9mm or some other pistol calibre and shot the lock off a gate? Not gonna happen folks, not gonna happen.
The NY Times is circling the drain now too. They just sold off the company jet and last week, they sold their office building and is actually leasing a part of it back to run their “news” paper.
Sorry… I suck at double checking when I’m slammed at work. Too bad I can’t edit my comment. :)
Too many anti-gun persons learn all they know from exposure to film and TV gun play. Defense is called murder by the anti’s but termination of innocents (unborn children) is OK. And our President is leading the pack on this…..
Avid gun rights activists call the VICTIMS of these shootings “scumbags”???? How foul is that???
This cretin doesn’t teach journalism; he teaches propaganda and indoctrination! No wonder today’s reporters can’t get it right!
Recently here in Cincy, a guy was arrested for strangling and sexually abusing a 13-year old girl (named Esmey Kenney), then burning her body with lighter fluid. If she’d had a gun, would she have been wrong to shoot him? Apparently, Ladd Everitt thinks she’d be some sort of ‘scumbag’.
The backstory is that this waste of life had been convicted of murdering his wife (also strangled and burned), and was released on parole. he was thrown out of a treatment center for fightng with other residents, and is now suspected in at least seven other killings…all where the victims were doused with flammable liquid and burned.
My first question is: How is it that the police authorities, who are unable to connect these crimes with rather obvious similarities and begin profiling a suspect, how are they going to tell me that citizens should be unable to defend themselves from monsters like this? My next question is: Does anyone else really expect me to take this sort of thing seriously—to obey the law when it places my life or the lives of children) in danger?
Count me among the ‘scumbags’, buddy.