quote:

---

Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
If US legislators have made it harder for potential lunatics to own guns after each of the spate of school shootings over the years that hasn't been reported in our news media.

---

No, they really haven't. And it seems to remain politically impossible for them to do so.

Interestingly, in South Africa, the doctors (primaily paediatric surgeons who were fed up with kids getting shot) successfully campaigned for tighter laws and saw a significant drop in gunshot wounds in children.

There are some really good studies from the states that show having a gun makes you around 4.5 times more likely to be shot.

But still, I don't expect to see any change soon.


Then I'm not American, so what do I know?

AFZ
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
US Shipmates will tell us that the vast majority of gun-crime in the US is perpetrated by people with illegal fire-arms ... ie. it's largely drug and gang-related.

The lone nutter wandering into a shopping mall, cinema or church and firing indescriminately is mercifully rare and accounts for a small proportion of gun deaths across the country.

Attitudes vary both across and within States and between urban and rural areas.

I must admit, comments on the Ship by US posters has curbed my previous tendency to scoff and carp at the US over this issue - and I can see why it would be appropriate for US citizens to have the right to bear arms - at least in certain areas.

All that said, I do think that's something terribly amiss -- but the issue is more complicated and nuanced than it can look to those of us with an ocean or hemisphere between us and the USA.
 

---

Posted by Jane R (# 331) on :
 
Alan:

quote:

---

I'm pretty sure that each such enquiry has been followed by changes in the law to restrict gun ownership - to reduce the number of things for which one may legitimately own a gun, to tighten regulations on storage of guns and license requirements etc.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
US Shipmates will tell us that the vast majority of gun-crime in the US is perpetrated by people with illegal fire-arms ... ie. it's largely drug and gang-related.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jane R:
Alan:

quote:

---

I'm pretty sure that each such enquiry has been followed by changes in the law to restrict gun ownership - to reduce the number of things for which one may legitimately own a gun, to tighten regulations on storage of guns and license requirements etc.

---

They did change the law after Hungerford and Dunblane, but not after Derek Bird's shooting spree. ISTR that the government decided that the laws on who could own a shotgun were already as strict as was reasonable.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jane R:
Alan:

quote:

---

I'm pretty sure that each such enquiry has been followed by changes in the law to restrict gun ownership - to reduce the number of things for which one may legitimately own a gun, to tighten regulations on storage of guns and license requirements etc.

---

They did change the law after Hungerford and Dunblane, but not after Derek Bird's shooting spree. ISTR that the government decided that the laws on who could own a shotgun were already as strict as was reasonable.

---

Thanks for that info.

There does come a point where further changes would be unreasonable. I have no problem with an enquiry reaching a "we don't need to change things" decision. But, an enquiry into a gun related incident on which gun-laws were not even on the table would seem very strange to me.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
... No matter how strict gun laws are, I can't see any way of stopping a hardened criminal or a drug gang from getting guns. But, strict gun laws must surely reduce the ability of ordinary people going off the rails being able to get a gun, and reduce the number of accidental deaths and injuries caused by guns being too readily accessible in the home.

---

Unfortunately, the logic applied in the USA is ordinary people should not be restricted from getting guns when criminals can apparently get as many guns as they want. And that the fantasy of being a hero one day outweighs all the actual accidental deaths, suicides, and murders involving ordinary people and their guns. Even our little virtual community isn't safe - we lost a Shipmate to the gun culture in the USA.
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Really, I must have been preoccupied with other stuff - which Shippie was it who was shot and killed in the US?





The trouble is -- as far as the gun thing goes across the Pond, the NRA are actually quite moderate compared with some of the more ardent, 'You ain't gonna take ma shootin' irons off a-me' types.
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
On the Hungerford thing - yes. Until Ryan went on the rampage I didn't actually know that it had been legal to own AK47s and what-not here ...

I'd just assumed that it wasn't legal to own anything more powerful than a .22 air rifle or a shotgun ... because those were the only firearms I'd ever seen anyone used or used myself -- generally to fire wide and stop my mates from taking pot shots at blackbirds - in the case of the air-rifles - and at clay-pigeons in the case of the shotguns.

I've had US pundits say to me, 'Why did you allow yourselves to be disarmed?'

To which I've always replied, 'Well, I wasn't aware that we were actually armed in the first place ...'

The problem, it seems to me, is the kind of visceral and inveterate connection that the US makes between gun ownership and civil liberties / freedom.

I can understand where that comes from - the 2nd Amendment - but it's all taken completely out of context of course -- the original context being 'a well regulated militia' not individual ownership of anything from a pop-gun through automatic weapons to anti-tank missiles and a thermo-nuclear device.

I've had Americans say to me that the citizenry should be allowed by right to have access to whatever weaponry the military have ...



That sort of thing seems ingrained in some areas of some States. The reality is that no US administration is going to be able to tackle the issue of levying stricter levels of gun control without there being civil unrest or a violent backlash.

The whole thing seems to be polarising and getting worse to me -- both the US right and the US left seem to be increasingly paranoid from where I'm sitting.
 

---

Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
US Shipmates will tell us that the vast majority of gun-crime in the US is perpetrated by people with illegal fire-arms ... ie. it's largely drug and gang-related.

The lone nutter wandering into a shopping mall, cinema or church and firing indescriminately is mercifully rare and accounts for a small proportion of gun deaths across the country.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Attitudes vary both across and within States and between urban and rural areas.

I must admit, comments on the Ship by US posters has curbed my previous tendency to scoff and carp at the US over this issue - and I can see why it would be appropriate for US citizens to have the right to bear arms - at least in certain areas.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
All that said, I do think that's something terribly amiss -- but the issue is more complicated and nuanced than it can look to those of us with an ocean or hemisphere between us and the USA.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Mere Nick:
It appears Roof was legally prohibited from packing heat because he had pending felony charges. It also appears he had the gun because his father gave it to him. It also appears that if his dad knew of the pending felony charges, his dad could be put away for 10 years.

---

quote:

---

One key part of this horrific scheme -- the weapon -- came in April, when Roof bought a .45-caliber handgun at a Charleston gun store, the two law enforcement officials told Perez and Bruer from CNN, the first network to report this development. His grandfather says that Roof was given "birthday money" and that the family didn't know what Roof did with it.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Adeodatus:
I'm not American, and I've only been to the USA once in my life. That was to California, which I gather is a cultural world away from South Carolina. I don't know enough about American history and culture to offer a critique. But I believe that every time something like this happens, the sensible, decent Americans - the majority - who question a culture in which this can happen, gain some ground in their argument. More power to them.

I was heartened this morning to come across this clip of Jon Stewart talking on the subject - and more heartened by the applause he got.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Tukai:
What is the world coming to when you can be shot while at church in a prayer meeting (as in Charleston, USA)?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by lilBuddha:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Tukai:
What is the world coming to when you can be shot while at church in a prayer meeting (as in Charleston, USA)?

---

Why is it so much worse because they were praying?
------------
This incident is horrible, but if it hadn't happened, there would be no significant variation in the percentage of people shot to death in the US. People are killed every day because of guns. Because guns are prevelant. Children die by the dozens each year because mommy and daddy wanted to protect them from baddies. People kill friends, and strangers because they got mad and had a gun before a cool down. People are killed because someone else was careless. All those deaths are somehow OK because of the vague fear of criminals and the government.
Greater access to guns means greater numbers of dead people. Full fucking stop.
I don't hate America, but if there were a reason, it would be guns.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Really, I must have been preoccupied with other stuff - which Shippie was it who was shot and killed in the US?

---

Genevieve was shot by (IIRC) a mentally ill, homeless person who had been receiving food from Genevieve's church. He couldn't afford food, but he somehow obtained a gun -- despite mental health issues.
 

---

Posted by Pigwidgeon (# 10192) on :
 
Just a year ago here in Phoenix, a recently-released felon broke into a Roman Catholic rectory where two priests lived. He had no gun, but had an angle iron as a weapon, which he used to beat Father Terra. Father Terra got away long enough to go into his bedroom and retrieve a gun that he kept for self-defense. The suspect then wrestled the weapon away and shot and killed Father Kenneth Walker, who had woken when he heard the disturbance and tried to assist Father Terra.

Sorry NRA, but Father Walker might still be alive if his roommate hadn’t kept a gun for his and his roommate’s own “safety.”
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Gosh - I remember Genevieve and knew she had died but I hadn't realised the circumstances.





Meanwhile, thanks Cliffdweller, Kelly Alves and other US posters for clarifying some points. I don't live in the US, of course, but Cliffdweller's point about hand-guns makes sense to me -- as, sadly, does the news that people have been going out and stocking up because the gun-lobbyists have been putting it about that Obama's about to take everyone's guns off them.

I'm careful what I say as I have gone a bit over-the-top in the past and upset some US posters with overly personal remarks that were meant to be satirical but which went beyond the 10 Commandments here.


 

---

Posted by L'organist (# 17338) on :
 
I think the statement by President Obama was very brave when he said

quote:

---

At some point, we as a country will have to reckon with the fact that this kind of mass violence does not happen in other advanced countries. It doesn't happen in other places with this kind of frequency. It is in our power to do something about it.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Pigwidgeon:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Really, I must have been preoccupied with other stuff - which Shippie was it who was shot and killed in the US?

---

Genevieve was shot by (IIRC) a mentally ill, homeless person who had been receiving food from Genevieve's church. He couldn't afford food, but he somehow obtained a gun -- despite mental health issues.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Kelly Alves:
Oh, thank God that he said that. About time.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Kelly Alves:
The pastor who died was on record voting in favor of gun control. But I guess by virtue of living somewhere where gun control efforts are failing, he had it coming, right?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
That seems to be what the NRA are saying.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gramps49:

They dread the browning of America.

It does not help to have a racist flag flying over the governor's mansion in South Carolina.

Roof was so far into his racism he had a jacket with both the Rhodesian flag and the White Union of South Africa flag on one of his coats. There is a group of extemists out there there who claim the white race has been exterminated in those countries.

Give a racist a gun and some bad stuff can happen.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Kelly Alves:
... As to the above--that's another thing that bothered me about bib's post-- it kind of hinted that the NRA and people like Roof are definitive Americans while the victims somehow are not. Which idea is both insulting to the victims, and reinforces the idea that brown folk are lesser citizens than white Americans. ...

---

quote:

---

The purpose of a gun is to kill, so why am I not surprised that massacres happen when people are allowed to own guns. If people demand the right to bear arms, then I'm afraid they must live (and die) with the consequences.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I've had Americans say to me that the citizenry should be allowed by right to have access to whatever weaponry the military have ...



That sort of thing seems ingrained in some areas of some States.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by hilaryg:
This view seemed to be consistent across the political spectrum, so I had to conclude it's a cultural thing. In the UK we are far more likely to go on a protest, write to our MP, campaign or even throw a riot to make our voices heard.

---

quote:

---

We already forgive him for what he's done, and there's nothing but love from our side of the family.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by hilaryg:
This view seemed to be consistent across the political spectrum, so I had to conclude it's a cultural thing. In the UK we are far more likely to go on a protest, write to our MP, campaign or even throw a riot to make our voices heard.

I think there is another factor at play too - the UK/European tendency to collectivism means that 'something is done' easier vs the US focus on individualism, where it is harder to get consensus for paradigm-shifts in thinking.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Adeodatus:
And then this happens. If you can't access the link, Sharonda Singleton's son says

quote:

---

We already forgive him for what he's done, and there's nothing but love from our side of the family.

---

Radiant faith.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Enoch:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Kelly Alves:
... As to the above--that's another thing that bothered me about bib's post-- it kind of hinted that the NRA and people like Roof are definitive Americans while the victims somehow are not. Which idea is both insulting to the victims, and reinforces the idea that brown folk are lesser citizens than white Americans. ...

---

Kelly, I may be wrong. I can't interpret someone else's intentions for them. But I think that's very unlikely and almost certainly unfair to bib. What he/she actually said was,

quote:

---

The purpose of a gun is to kill, so why am I not surprised that massacres happen when people are allowed to own guns. If people demand the right to bear arms, then I'm afraid they must live (and die) with the consequences.

---

To any non-US person, who doesn't live in a gun-totting culture, that statement isn't a political statement or a verdict on ethnicity - who is a true American. If you allow/encourage people to be armed, some of them will get shot. Usually they will be the wrong people.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Penny S:

Does the NRA have investments in arms manufacturers?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Porridge:
But from would-be leaders, mind-boggling idiocy.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
That sounds horribly real Big Sis, do you have references?

---

quote:

---

In his recent U.C. Davis Law Review article "The Hidden History of the Second Amendment," Roger Williams University School of Law Professor Carl T. Bogus offers a thesis that could forever change the way Americans view the Second Amendment: James Madison wrote the Second Amendment to assure the southern states that Congress would not undermine the slave system by disarming the militia, which were then the principal instruments of slave control throughout the South.
...

In his 99-page article, Professor Bogus argues that the evidence - including an analysis of Madison's original language, and an understanding of how he and other founders drew on England's Declaration of Rights - strongly suggests that Madison wrote this provision for the specific purpose of assuring his constituency that Congress could not use its newly acquired power to deprive the states of an armed militia. Madison's concern, Professor Bogus argues, was not hunting, self-defense, national defense, or resistance to governmental tyranny but slave control.
... the hidden history is important because it fundamentally changes how we think about the right to keep and bear arms. The Second Amendment takes on an entirely different complexion when instead of being symbolized by a musket in the hands of the minutemen, it is associated with a musket in the hands of the slave holder.

---

quote:

---

For the great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie - deliberate, contrived, and dishonest - but the myth - persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic. Too often we hold fast to the cliches of our forebears. We subject all facts to a prefabricated set of interpretations. We enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.
-John F. Kennedy

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gramps49:
Instead of responding in anger to the shooting, I am taken by the response of forgiveness from Mother Emanuel members to the shooter. Even the shooter remarked how he almost did not go through with the shooting because of the love and acceptance he was feeling from the people at Mother Emanuel. Too bad he had not gotten to know them before his mind was made up.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gramps49:
A Litany for Charleston

---

Amen
 

---

Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Brenda Clough:
These people are truly Christian:
The late pastor of the church

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Enoch:
If you allow/encourage people to be armed, some of them will get shot. Usually they will be the wrong people. Guns are dangerous things. So, for that matter are cars, lorries and buses. They kill a lot of people too, but that isn't what we have them for. At least people don't very often drive at others deliberately or threaten them with a chevvy.

Perhaps I am wrong. Perhaps those of us in the rest of the world are wrong. But from outside the US, a lot of casual shootings and occasional massacres are the automatic downside of having an armed population.

Unfortunately, it's also true that if guns are readily available, if even any petty criminal is probably carrying one, and if the police are ineffective, one can't really forbid the law-abiding public from arming to protect themselves.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
the NRA are saying that it's his fault that they are dead, because if he hadn't voted for gun control, everyone at the bible study could have been packing heat, and would have been able to kill the attacker.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
I've still got the start of my sermon to write. But, the end wrote itself. I've got Paul talking about his weakness being strength. True strength in God contrasts with strength of arms. I finish with true strength. I finish by quoting the families of the nine people murdered on Wednesday. "I forgive you".

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Kelly Alves:
The boldness of Obama's remarks on Thursday gives some hope-- the fact that he didn't hold back or try to craft diplomatic acknowledgements to the gun lobby may be a sign that a tipping point has been reached.
Tip it, dear Lord, tip it.

---

Since he's in his second term, can't stand again and has nothing to lose, couldn't he chose this as his one last push?
 

---

Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
How? He's utterly powerless. Like the Pope in even incrementally limited marriage reform. Guantanamo empty is it?

[ 21. June 2015, 09:37: Message edited by: Martin60 ]
 

---

Posted by Alan Cresswell (# 31) on :
 
Presumably if it's assumed that attempting to tighten gun control laws is politically unpopular and will result in a loss of votes, then to enact such laws in the first term is going to make a second term hard to achieve. And, if done before the last set of mid terms will reflect badly in the polls for Democrats. The question is, would action by Obama result in handing votes to whichever Republican candidate buys enough votes in the primaries?

That does of course assume that gun control is a guaranteed vote loser. Sure there are a large minority of people who would consider any President who suggests gun control to be someone they would never vote for - but, are any of those people likely to vote Democrat anyway? It seems from reactions I've read from the US that there might be a sizable fraction of people in the middle ground who would consider gun control to be a good thing, and might vote Democrat rather than Republican next year if Obama tried for that.

Though, given the way Senate and Congress are stacked at present he might not have a chance to get anything passed. But, if enough people want to see it and find that their representatives are blocking it then perhaps that will be reflected in the ballot box.
 

---

Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on :
 
Every single time I follow threads like this one, which is every time a major US shooting incident make UK news, the feeling I get is that American Democracy has a gun pointing at it's head.
It can't possibly be right that a country, a world Super-Power, a place that achieves much, and somewhere many good things have come from should be in such a predicament.

I mean for a democracy surely a simple referendum on gun control "Yes" or "No" would be a start. Then let all the shouting and hollering have it's way, and see if something better than what you've currently got can't come out of it.
 

---

Posted by Pigwidgeon (# 10192) on :
 
Even when a member of Congress was shot and very seriously wounded four years ago -- and six people killed, including a 9-year-old girl -- Congress won't do anything. That former Congress member, Gabby Giffords, and her astronaut husband, Mark Kelly, have set up Americans for Responsible Solutions asking for background checks, etc., not for a total ban. Unfortunately, I doubt that they'll accomplish much.
 

---

Posted by sabine (# 3861) on :
 
Our society needs to have some very deep and difficult conversations about violence of this sort, and I'm not sure how many people are willing to engage in conversations that will lead to changes not more political polarization.

And there are many variables, guns, racism, and others. For example, I heard David Brooks (a New York Times columnist) mention on PBS that the US has an "alienated, lone young man" problem. Instead of thinking that these sorts of murders are not society's problem because they are the work of a lone person, we need to ask ourselves what causes such alienation.

Unpacking all of the things that lead to repeated situations of mass murders will take us places we don't want to go and will force ourselves to look at the idealized glow we put upon our narrative of who we are.

People in power have no incentive to start the conversation because it may well lead to a loss of power for them.

As long as we operate on a "what's best for me alone" philosophy, there will be no incentive to start the conversation.

As long as political operatives (seen and unseen) continue to politicize basic issues of the nature of racism, alienation, and violence, there will be no incentive to start the conversation.

As long as we cling to our fears or claim we will change if someone else changes first, there will be no incentive to start the conversation.

We need bold, prophetic voices to both illuminate the issues and assure us that we will be better for having engaged in the process of change.

As long as fear leads, we will not move forward.

sabine
 

---

Posted by Kelly Alves (# 2522) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
Presumably if it's assumed that attempting to tighten gun control laws is politically unpopular and will result in a loss of votes, then to enact such laws in the first term is going to make a second term hard to achieve. And, if done before the last set of mid terms will reflect badly in the polls for Democrats. The question is, would action by Obama result in handing votes to whichever Republican candidate buys enough votes in the primaries?

.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gramps49:
I know this is too late to be included in your worship on Sunday (as Sunday is already upon you), but you might want to use it in your private worship

A Litany for Charleston

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Kelly Alves:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
Presumably if it's assumed that attempting to tighten gun control laws is politically unpopular and will result in a loss of votes, then to enact such laws in the first term is going to make a second term hard to achieve. And, if done before the last set of mid terms will reflect badly in the polls for Democrats. The question is, would action by Obama result in handing votes to whichever Republican candidate buys enough votes in the primaries?

.

---

There you have it. There was a reason Dems were rending their garments over the outcome of the midterms a few months back.

I guess what encouages me is-- politicians are politicians. They are not going to issue a public statement confirming the wetness of water unless they can leverage it somehow. The fact that Obama was so solid in his call for gun control makes me hope he sensed something in the political air that made it the right time to strike.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gramps49:
Several things came together in this shooting

1) The underlying racism in the South (it is actually everywhere, just more so in the American South) as evidenced by the Stars and Bars--the Confederate flag).

---

quote:

---

I've had US pundits say to me, 'Why did you allow yourselves to be disarmed?'

To which I've always replied, 'Well, I wasn't aware that we were actually armed in the first place ...'

---

quote:

---

A UK radio programme last night was discussing the issue with a USA commentator who lives over here. I had to turn it off. He was pushing the NRA view of the need for everyone to be armed, and saying how afraid he was here of knife crime.

---

Because being shot by some random nutcase is so much more democratic, yes?

Carrying a big knife around is illegal here as well. Knives are easier to get hold of than guns, of course.

If someone is attacking you with a knife, martial arts (or running away very fast) is likely to be more use than a gun anyway.
 

---

Posted by Alan Cresswell (# 31) on :
 
There's another big difference between guns and knives. With some form of confrontation involving guns (eg: between two gangs, between a gang of robbers and armed security/police, or between a home owner and a burgler) there is a high probability of one or more bullets missing the intended target and harming an innocent bystander. It's very difficult for innocent bystanders to be harmed in a knife fight.
 

---

Posted by Crœsos (# 238) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Nick Tamen:
Without question, racism manifests itself in distinctive ways (and perhaps at time manifests itself more openly) in the South, due to particular historic and cultural influences. And of course, one is not likely to find a Confederate flag at a state capitol outside a few Southern states. The use of Confederate flags by white supremacists, however, is no more confined to the South than white supremacists themselves are.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Crœsos:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Nick Tamen:
Without question, racism manifests itself in distinctive ways (and perhaps at time manifests itself more openly) in the South, due to particular historic and cultural influences. And of course, one is not likely to find a Confederate flag at a state capitol outside a few Southern states. The use of Confederate flags by white supremacists, however, is no more confined to the South than white supremacists themselves are.

---

It should be noted that the flying of the Confederate flag at the South Carolina Capitol was instituted in 1962 as part of a backlash among southern whites against the gains being made at the time by the civil rights movement. I think that's an important context to remember regarding this particular Confederate emblem, at least.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Brenda Clough:
If a major political party spends many years telling everybody that the government is bad, that the only thing to do is to get rid of it, then it is not surprising that the more dimbulbed section of the populace does believe them.

(Necessarily they are the weaker intellects, since a moment's thought reveals all the really important things that the federal government, and only they, can do. You know, things like the armed forces, the interstate highway system, Medicare, Social Security.)

And, once you assume that the goverment is bad and that it is necessary to get rid of it, preparing to fight it with arms is not that big a jump.

---

So, would that apply to 1776 too?



 

---

Posted by Brenda Clough (# 18061) on :
 
Every now and then a letter makes the rounds on FB, purporting to be from the Queen. Essentially informing the US that she's taking us back.
 

---

Posted by beatmenace (# 16955) on :
 
Brenda Clough posted

quote:

---

Every now and then a letter makes the rounds on FB, purporting to be from the Queen. Essentially informing the US that she's taking us back

---

quote:

---

Yes, Jane R - I'm well aware that archery practice was compulsory in the Middle Ages and that most fellas carried daggers in Elizabethan times.

---

Sorry if that came across as patronising - it wasn't meant to.

Of course the real reason why weapons were scarce at the beginning of the (English) Civil War was poverty. Given a choice between buying something that could keep my family from starving and buying a pike (or whatever) that might never be used, I'd go for the farm implement too. And muskets and swords were even more expensive.
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Sure - which is exactly why the county armories were in such a parlous state. The Commissioners of Array and the county magnates responsible for maintaining them used to cut costs.

Of course, colonels during the Civil Wars were meant to pay and equip their troops at their own expense to a certain extent - and so sometimes falsified accounts and reports on troop numbers in order to draw down more money.

It also explains why there was so much foraging and plundering - as well as troops being billeted on civilian populations and eating them out of house and home.

People's diets were pretty meagre at the best of times, but hunger became a huge issue during the Civil War - both for combatants and non-combatants.

Going back even further, of course, the English navy ran short of ammunition when harrying the Spanish Armada because Queen Elizabeth was too mean to equip the ships properly.
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
There's an interesting aside here in terms of the US Revolution / War of Independence.

I've heard some Americans claim that the causus belli was the British government trying to seize their guns. Sure, the British did seize muskets and shot at Concord - but the thing they were really after were a set of siege cannon that the disaffected Colonists there had somehow obtained - illegally.

As I understand it, militias weren't allowed to have cannon and that artillery was seen as the preserve of central government. Gunpowder could only be obtained through official channels - a throw back to 1605 and the Gunpowder Plot.

There could only be one possible reason for the disaffected Colonists to be stock-piling cannon - not for defence but for offence - these were artillery pieces that could have been used to bombard Boston harbour.

In modern terms it would be as if someone were stockpiling weapons of mass destruction in Arizona or Nevada. Hardly surprising the authorities sent a column to Concord via Lexington in order to lay hold of potentially dangerous stock-piles of illegally held weaponry.
 

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Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on :
 
I've read somewhere that proportionately to the population at their respective times, the overall death toll in the Civil War, including civilians and disease in both cases, was higher than that in the UK in either of the two World Wars in the C20.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
It depends how you count it, Enoch, but from what I've read and heard I think it was certainly proportionately higher than that in WW1. Not sure about WW2.

The proportion was disproportionate, as it were, in various parts of the country and was higher in Scotland and Ireland than in England and Wales.

Even so, there is the oft-quoting and shocking statistic of a village in Shropshire which lost a considerable proportion of those who marched away to war -- although it's by no means clear how representative this was. Some of the stats are based on using that as a base or 'norm' - but it would be rather like taking the casualties from one of the Pals battalions in WW1 - Accrington, say or Leeds - where the Pals system led to disproportionately high casualty figures from particular communities - and extrapolating that across the UK as a whole.

That said, I think the deaths from plague and other diseases were pretty horrendous - I think I read somewhere that up to 30% of Bristol's population perished from disease, privation and so on during the city's two sieges and their aftermath. Extrapolate that into modern terms and figures then you're talking about death on a massive scale.
 

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Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Without minimising horror, in modern terms the number of casualties in some of the much cited atrocities and massacres were pretty low -

12 men killed at Barthomley (near here) in a massacre that was laid to the King's charge during his trial - even though he was nowhere near the place at the time and it seems to have been a knee-jerk response by royalist troops fired on from the church tower.

30 massacred at Hopton Castle in Shropshire as it fell to besieging Royalist forces.

Perhaps 150 massacred at Basing House as it fell to Parliamentarian forces.

This puts the figures of 2,500 to 3,000 massacred at Drogheda and Wexford into perspective ie. highly unusual and way above average - and a mix of combatants and non-combatants too.

There were also around 100 Welsh women slaughtered by Parliamentarian troops after the battle of Naseby because they were mistaken for Irish women - and their cooking knives taken for offensive weapons.

All terrible events, but relatively low in casualties compared to continental warfare at that time - particularly the Thirty Years War.

But ...


 

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Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on :
 
The safest places to be in the Civil War were London, East Anglia and south east of London because they were under the control of one side all the way through. You still got plundered there and your sons were impressed, but the general destruction was less. The worst places to be were Scotland, Ireland and Wales, as the levels of local destruction and animosity were much higher.
 

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Posted by Moo (# 107) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
...there was so much foraging and plundering - as well as troops being billeted on civilian populations and eating them out of house and home.

People's diets were pretty meagre at the best of times, but hunger became a huge issue during the Civil War - both for combatants and non-combatants.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
...but according to an expert I've heard speak, impressment was never as bad as the mythology suggests and in the navy at least, it was rare to press landlubbers -- they usually went for trained merchant seamen who 'knew the ropes'.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Porridge:
I wonder what it means that a discussion originally about a massacre of African-American Bible-studiers has morphed into a discussion of the English Civil War?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
There is a connection too, insofar as British concepts of the role and responsibilities of the militia in relation to the regular army and the county magistrates and so on has a direct bearing on the way conditions developed that led to the outbreak of rebellion in the 13 Colonies.

Also, there's an argument that the US Revolution was effectively the English Civil Wars Round 2 ...

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quote:

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Originally posted by mr cheesy:
I don't believe there is any serious argument of that. All of your historical claims are disputed, you've just laid out a view of history and vaguely linked it to conditions in the USA. Your knowledge of history is poor and the link is tenuous.

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quote:

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Originally posted by orfeo:
I'm wondering now whether flag "etymology" is flag meaning. What the flag meant in the 1860s doesn't necessarily tell us exactly what it means to people now.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Moo:

quote:

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Originally posted by orfeo:
I'm wondering now whether flag "etymology" is flag meaning. What the flag meant in the 1860s doesn't necessarily tell us exactly what it means to people now.

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The flag that is now considered the Confederate flag was originally the battle flag. The Stars and Bars was another flag as was the Bonny Blue Flag. The national anthem of the Confederacy has the refrain,
Hurrah for the bonny blue flag that bears a single star.

Moo

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quote:

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Originally posted by orfeo:
I'm wondering now whether flag "etymology" is flag meaning. What the flag meant in the 1860s doesn't necessarily tell us exactly what it means to people now.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:
What else could it possibly mean?

Oh, I wish I was in the land of cotton.
Old times there are not forgotten.

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quote:

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Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Must be mirror the Confederate flag. The evil of its creation, inititial and continued use are obscuring the good it has overseen. Now, just what was that good bit again?

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quote:

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Originally posted by orfeo:

I get that the flag has a hell of a lot of negative connotations. I also get that the greater good here will be to stop flying it in these public spaces. The bit that makes me uncomfortable is telling individuals "this flag means you're a horrible racist", telling them what it means to them.

Because it doesn't automatically mean the same thing to each individual person that it means to Dylan Roof. Just because to him it represents something that is also represented by the apartheid South African flag and the Rhodesian flag, doesn't mean that's what it represents to each and every person.

In exactly the same that just because a swastika represents a certain something to a neo-Nazi, doesn't mean it represents the same thing to a Hindu.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Moo:
The flag that is now considered the Confederate flag was originally the battle flag. The Stars and Bars was another flag as was the Bonny Blue Flag. The national anthem of the Confederacy has the refrain,
Hurrah for the bonny blue flag that bears a single star.

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quote:

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Originally posted by orfeo:
I get that the flag has a hell of a lot of negative connotations. I also get that the greater good here will be to stop flying it in these public spaces. The bit that makes me uncomfortable is telling individuals "this flag means you're a horrible racist", telling them what it means to them.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Eutychus:
As I suggested in Hell, it looks like the move to remove the confederate flag may indeed be a way of striking at a relevant symbol rather than getting mired in a gun control debate: link

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quote:

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Originally posted by Nick Tamen:
Though as someone who has lived in the American South all of my 50+ years, I would say I don't encounter this attitude nearly as often as I encounter the opposite attitude: "This flag stands for heritage. I'm not offended by it, so no one else should be either. Anyone who is offended doesn't know what they're talking about." I hear that with alarming regularity.

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quote:

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Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Do you have any clue what this "heritage" is that they are fighting so hard to maintain this symbolic representation of?

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quote:

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--Re the Southern heritage that people are looking back to: Not a Southerner, but it seems to be a (perceived) Golden Age.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Mere Nick:

quote:

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Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Do you have any clue what this "heritage" is that they are fighting so hard to maintain this symbolic representation of?

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When you boil it down, it is the sad memory of the massive number of men killed by the war. More died in the civil war than in all the other wars through Korea, combined. As a percentage of population, it was worse than decimation for the southern soldiers. If things had worked out to where war could have been avoided or maybe even ended early with a minimum of casualties there wouldn't be such pain to remember.

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quote:

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Originally posted by cliffdweller:

quote:

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Originally posted by Mere Nick:

quote:

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Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Do you have any clue what this "heritage" is that they are fighting so hard to maintain this symbolic representation of?

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When you boil it down, it is the sad memory of the massive number of men killed by the war. More died in the civil war than in all the other wars through Korea, combined. As a percentage of population, it was worse than decimation for the southern soldiers. If things had worked out to where war could have been avoided or maybe even ended early with a minimum of casualties there wouldn't be such pain to remember.

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Yes- it was a horrible war.

Although, according to
The Civil War Trust Northern casualties were more numerous than Southern.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Lyda*Rose:
Golden Key:

quote:

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--Re the Southern heritage that people are looking back to: Not a Southerner, but it seems to be a (perceived) Golden Age.

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If you weren't black.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Mere Nick:

quote:

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Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Do you have any clue what this "heritage" is that they are fighting so hard to maintain this symbolic representation of?

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When you boil it down, it is the sad memory of the massive number of men killed by the war. More died in the civil war than in all the other wars through Korea, combined. As a percentage of population, it was worse than decimation for the southern soldiers. If things had worked out to where war could have been avoided or maybe even ended early with a minimum of casualties there wouldn't be such pain to remember.

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quote:

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Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Southern pride. What does that mean? What is "The South"? It is a region whose identity is tied to the American Civil War which was fought to protect Slavery.
Would a general "Southern" quality exist without that? Likely. And I'm not reducing the South to its participation in that conflict. But that flag is inextricably tied to that.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Mere Nick:
When you boil it down, it is the sad memory of the massive number of men killed by the war. More died in the civil war than in all the other wars through Korea, combined. As a percentage of population, it was worse than decimation for the southern soldiers. If things had worked out to where war could have been avoided or maybe even ended early with a minimum of casualties there wouldn't be such pain to remember.

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quote:

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Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Perhaps the problem is, we haven't found a way to mourn the senseless deaths of soldiers in a fruitless (or evil) war.

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quote:

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We saw this in Vietnam and Iraq, where, long after the country had figured out these were stupid wars, we continued to send men and women into battle so that "those who had lost their lives will not have died in vain." As if adding to their numbers would somehow make their deaths any less tragic.

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quote:

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The same seems to be at play here. It is unbelievably tragic that the South suffered such enormous losses in the Civil War. The grief from the loss of those husbands, fathers, and sons would have been felt deeply for generations (although perhaps not quite so personally today, one assumes...). But the fact remains that they died for all the wrong reasons. They died for a lie-- a horrible, evil, lie straight from hell. Their deaths were "in vain". And pretending they died for some other, more noble reason-- for "heritage", or "community", or "freedom" or "state's rights" does not make their deaths any less tragic.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Mere Nick:

quote:

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Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Do you have any clue what this "heritage" is that they are fighting so hard to maintain this symbolic representation of?

---

When you boil it down, it is the sad memory of the massive number of men killed by the war. More died in the civil war than in all the other wars through Korea, combined. As a percentage of population, it was worse than decimation for the southern soldiers. If things had worked out to where war could have been avoided or maybe even ended early with a minimum of casualties there wouldn't be such pain to remember.

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quote:

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Originally posted by lilBuddha:
And that is exactly what that flag does. As long as it is flown, as long as it is used as a symbol of "Southern Pride", slavery and oppression will be the lens through which everyone else views the South. And rightly so.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gamaliel:
There have certainly been attempts to re-position the South and emphasise its cultural contributions - William Faulkner in literature, Cajun cooking, the blues, jazz, soul music ...

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quote:

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Part of the problem, of course, is its tragic history and the way it's so often presented as rather 'gothic', outlandish and bizarre ... friendly people and so on -- but don't you get stranded down there on a fishing trip, boy ...

Whether that's a reflection of the reality, I don't know.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Nick Tamen:
Speaking of Vietnam, I think around the 50s or 60s, the flag also took on something of a counter-cultural symbol, sometimes unrelated to white supremacy. When I was a kid, I rarely heard the flag referred to a "the Confederate flag." It was "the Rebel flag," and often connoted a "question the powers that be, live your own life" attitude.

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quote:

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Originally posted by saysay:
Are there any other fans of the short-lived TV show Firefly (and the movie Serenity) on this thread? Because that show captured a lot of what people celebrate about Southern culture (minus all the slavery/racial baggage).

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quote:

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Originally posted by mousethief:
Southern? Really? I would have put it Wild Wild West. Train heists and gun battles aren't southern culture.

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quote:

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Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

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Originally posted by saysay:
Are there any other fans of the short-lived TV show Firefly (and the movie Serenity) on this thread? Because that show captured a lot of what people celebrate about Southern culture (minus all the slavery/racial baggage).

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Southern? Really? I would have put it Wild Wild West. Train heists and gun battles aren't southern culture.

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quote:

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The casting of Don Pedro Colley in the recurring role of Sheriff Little was intended to bring racial diversity to the series. Producers intentionally cast African American Actors for key or prominent guest roles for the same purpose and equal rights to all races.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Palimpsest:
So many of the southerners could have said they joined the fight to protect the rights of their state as the primary point. Only later did that become completely fused with the defense of slavery against those who would free the slaves.

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quote:

---

Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

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Originally posted by saysay:
Are there any other fans of the short-lived TV show Firefly (and the movie Serenity) on this thread? Because that show captured a lot of what people celebrate about Southern culture (minus all the slavery/racial baggage).

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Southern? Really? I would have put it Wild Wild West. Train heists and gun battles aren't southern culture.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Nick Tamen
Without a doubt, for the first generations after the Civil War, use of Confederate flags almost always took place in a memorial context. Confederate flags were generally not seen apart from memorial observances, monuments or the like.
<snip>
It was in the mid-20th Century that Confederate flags—particularly the Battle Flag—began to be used in other contexts. Often, of course, the context was white supremacy and opposition to desegregation and the Civil Rights Movement.

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quote:

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Originally posted by mousethief:
Southern? Really? I would have put it Wild Wild West. Train heists and gun battles aren't southern culture.

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quote:

---

Saysay wasn't talking about etiology but about CULTURE. The culture on Firefly is Wild West culture. All the terraformed planets they visit are pioneers making a hardscrabble living in the new frontier. That is NOT southern culture. Southern culture is genteel. The only genteel person is Inara. Everybody else is an outcast or a runaway. What's southern about that? Even if you say that much of the Wild West has to do with displaced rebellion, it's still the Wild West. Again, culture, not etiology of culture.

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quote:

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Originally posted by saysay:
That's not the majority; the majority are outcasts or runaways who spend a lot of time trying to avoid the government, particularly the federal government. At least in the places I've lived.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Mere Nick:

quote:

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Originally posted by saysay:
That's not the majority; the majority are outcasts or runaways who spend a lot of time trying to avoid the government, particularly the federal government. At least in the places I've lived.

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Everyone I know has a mailbox.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Mere Nick:
Everyone I know has a mailbox.

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quote:

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That and, looking at this population density map, it would seem that Wyoming is the place to avoid detection. Excepting the coast, the West is a more "avoid the feds and the neighbors" ksort of place.

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quote:

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Originally posted by saysay:
You're obviously referring to an Old South I haven't encountered. Because making a hardscrabble living is what, IME, the majority of people in the south do.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Palimpsest:
and gun battles aren't southern culture.

You need to go watch the Buster Keaton masterpiece "The General".

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quote:

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Dylann Roof, who is accused of killing nine people at a church in South Carolina three weeks ago, was only able to purchase the gun used in the attack because of breakdowns in the FBI’s background-check system, FBI Director James B. Comey said Friday.

Comey said that Roof should have been prevented from buying the .45-caliber weapon used in a shooting that authorities have said was motivated by Roof’s racist views.

<snip>

The lapse was the result of errors not only by the FBI but by the Lexington County prosecutors’ office, and Comey said he has ordered a review of procedures that led to the failure. The errors came to light as investigators examined a gun purchase Roof made two months before the shooting in Charleston.

Roof had been arrested for possession of narcotics in February, a felony charge that alone did not disqualify him from buying a gun. But Comey said that Roof’s subsequent admission of the drug crime would have triggered an automatic rejection of his gun purchase if the information had been properly recorded in background-check databases.

Instead, Comey said the data was not properly entered in the bureau’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), and that an FBI examiner assigned to review Roof’s purchase never saw his admission to the narcotics charge.

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