Reminder that guns don’t just “go off” and anyone that suggests this should be disregarded as the nincompoop they very clearly are.
guns certainly do “just go off”
That’s why you secure them, unload them, store them safely.
Pointing a gun at something should be treated with the same severity as pointing it at something and pulling the trigger. Yes, police included.
Confiscate the fucking town councilman’s guns, prosecute the dumbass for attempted murder and hopefully the teen will sue the living shit out of him.
From reading the story it sounds like the guy wasn’t trying to kill the teen, he’s just a giant irresponsible dumbass who should never had a gun in the first place, making all of them victims of the toxic US gun culture
It had to be raised and pointed to have a bullet go through the windshield and hit someone in the face. Don’t make excuses for the guy
I was taught when I first started shooting guns when I was 5 that you only point a gun at something that’s alive when you don’t want it to be alive anymore.
Hell I was never around guns as a kid and I was still taught this at a similar age.
Oh shit, my gun just went off
I’m not sure what he was expecting the gun to do. You never point at anything or anyone you don’t intend to destroy. Treat every gun as if it has a hair-trigger.
This is why stand your ground laws can’t realistically exist in places that aren’t sparsely populated. Because someone will read “defend your property and life with force if necessary” as “act as a raging lunatic and attempt to shoot anyone who comes at the door because it’s legal to do so if you claim you were defending your property”.
You are acting as if it were actually complicated. Requiring no duty to retreat makes perfect sense in your own home. The law most sane places says you have to be in a situation where a reasonable person would be in fear for life or bodily injury.
Note “reasonable person” is a common legal standard. A reasonable person doesn’t think someone outside is automatically a threat. People who shiit then ask questions go to jail.
Why should someone who is already breaking the law also enjoy the power of legal coercion to force you from a place you had the legal right to be, though?
“Well, we don’t want the situation to escalate. Someone could get hurt.” Why should the law protect only the welfare of criminals? Of the person actively breaking the law?
The issue with “Stand your Ground” laws is that the alternative is nonsensical if your view expands to include the rights and welfare of people who act consistent with the law.
They were in their car you stupid fuck.
I can’t imagine how that fucking matters
Thats obvious to everyone here you cant lmao
No
That’s a you problem.
Because human life is more valuable than things.
The problem is people applying laws like castle doctrine outside of situations that they were intended for… then shitty judges allow it to be applied outside of those situations… resulting in these random ass killings for people onocking on doors. Its messed up and horrible.
But at the same time a few years ago a family near my friends house had someone break in, killed the two parents and then chased down the son and killed him in the woods. The young man tried to retreat and was killed anyway. THEN they robbed the house. They were looking for stuff to steal and sell for drugs. Then they set the house on fire.
https://www.courant.com/2018/05/14/details-emerge-of-brutality-in-deaths-of-griswold-family-members/
If someone is legitimately breaking into your house you should be able to defend yourself if you can’t get away. It doesn’t need to be a gun, but you should not go to jail for hurting someone who is in your house who is not supposed to be there.
There’s no way to tell if that person is just a burglar or might fucking kill you over your stuff. What are you supposed to do? Ask them? “Excuse me criminal, are you the murderous type or just a burglar?”
Obviously leave if you can, but this case shows running away doesn’t always work. That poor family.
Human rights are more valuable than human life.
It’s an interesting implication that there is no right to life.
You’re saying no one ever dies that others might live?
That doesn’t apply to this situation or what you are saying at all.
You’re the one that brought it up, though. I’ve been talking about rights the whole time.
Is that true? Interesting. I am sure the dead are enjoying all of their human rights to the fullest.
I am interested in your ideas and wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
I am sure the dead are enjoying all of their human rights to the fullest.
You are, because they died for those rights. And it’s a good thing they did because they’d be ashamed of how little you think of their sacrifice.
LOL perfect
You should be able to use reasonable force. If you’re trying to subdue a homicidal maniac then you can choke them unconscious or knock them unconscious or kill them if that’s all you have means to do. But if you just have someone who wants to be rude and yell in your face, then you don’t have a right to kill them.
I think it depends on who causes the confrontation and who is escalating the situation to different levels of violence.
Also, I think there’s different ways to interpret stand your ground as a concept. You can stand your ground and use reasonable force to secure your safety. You should not be able to stand your ground and murder someone so as not to inconvenience yourself if you don’t want to take a step back or move out of someone’s way for example.
You should be able to use reasonable force.
Any amount of force that stops an attacker is reasonable, by definition. The only one who should have a legal obligation of care for the welfare of the lawbreaker is the one breaking the law.
But if you just have someone who wants to be rude and yell in your face
But it depends what they’re yelling. If they’re yelling “I’m five seconds from killing you!” then you do have a right to use whatever force is available to you to stop them, and that might very well mean their death; there actually aren’t any safe, harmless, perfectly non-lethal means of disabling an agitated, adrenaline-fueled human being.
If that’s something that you don’t want to happen to you, then don’t go into public space and assault the people there. It’s actually pretty easy to avoid.
Who was attacking who when two kids were sitting in their car?
No answer required, FYI.
Where was the car?
It doesn’t matter. No place would justify murder.
It’s not unreasonable that you might need to shoot someone who’s attacking you with a car
This has absolutely nothing to do with “Stand Your Ground”. SYG only applies when you or someone else are in real and imminent danger of serious bodily harm or death, neither of which were true in this case. That’s why the guy was arrested and has been charged with a number of serious offenses. He’s going to end up in prison.
Since you aren’t from the United States I should also tell you that SYG isn’t a National thing, its only legal in the States in that have passed laws allowing it.
I keep wondering if a legal framework like the US where you weren’t legally punished by attacking a thief in your house wouldn’t be fairer but then there’s news like this.
That’s called “Castle Doctrine” and like SYG it isn’t National. It only exists in the States that have passed a law to allow it.
It CAN work but there’s at least a few States that have Castle Doctrine and a Duty to Retreat so you end up having to flee a home invader until or unless you have no other choice.
I wasn’t necessarily thinking the law would protect the person who did this, but pondering if the existence of that legal framework does not create the impression that this is acceptable, even though it isn’t and that’s not what the law is.
And also, i do understand this isn’t applied everywhere in the US, but to me I see the US as a country. As a foreigner it’s probably very unlikely I’m going to refer to it as the law from Connecticut or whatever. I just know this law exists in the US and to be fair I’m not really that interested in knowing specifically where and the nuances of state to state legislation.
But nevertheless i thank you for clarifying the difference between Stand your ground and Castle doctrine and reminding me that it’s not a national thing.
Worked great for Zimmerman.
We have a make my day law in CO but it only applies inside your house
That’s such a sad way to put it; and yet still so accurate when it comes to these POSs.
This is the inevitable outcome of the combination of the proliferation of guns in the US + the over-the-top fearmongering of certain high-profile personalities (specifically on the right). It was never going to end any other way.
Scare people into thinking everyone is out to get them and tell them they have to arm themselves, and you get tragedies like this: the guy that shot a teenaged girl through his front door when she was looking for help. This kid shot in the face looking for a place to take pictures.
People like Tucker Carlson and all similar scaremongers (too many to name) are partly to blame for this. I’m old enough to remember the red scare, where average people thought communists were hiding in every suburban neighbourhood, and also the satanic panic – this is all that but on steroids.
Everyone isn’t out to get you. They never were. But people are becoming millionaires by riling people into killing each other *for no reason *, and unlike back then, now everyone is armed and convinced to shoot first like every place is the fucking OK Corral.
As someone who grew up near those wild west towns and have a lot of roots out here, yeah it’s a myth, most people I knew growing up didn’t even hunt, and most hunters I knew owned two guns tops and it WASN’T their personality, inviting you over to eat venison was their personality.
Or come help me butcher this boar and I’ll let you take home a couple pounds of sausage.
It’s not even a Wild West town, it’s conifer. It’s a rich person Mecca. Anyone that has a gun up there is most likely just using it to scare off wolves or bears, but not actually hunting (source, my in-laws live there).
I spent a lot of my childhood in Arizona, and we did field trips in school to ‘ghost towns’ (e: the old west towns), Montezuma’s Castle (back when you could actually walk through it before vandals ruined it for everyone), and Pueblo ruins with indigenous living history reenactors.
I never even saw a modern gun in person until I was 16. It just wasn’t a thing. And yet we managed to survive.
Yeah, grandmother grew up in a family that had been poor farmers outwest, and midwest for a long time. They had like 10 guns, but that is because there was one rifle per person over the age of 12, plus a couple shotguns. Not for like having a shoot-out, but for killing problematic predators. Only my great grandfather had a hand gun, and he only had that because it was a gift from someone he did a bunch of work for. He rarely took it out of the box.
We need to admit that some of the people fanatical about guns… really want to kill someone with one.
So I’m reading idiot who can’t read a situation and who is super scared, also has shit trigger discipline and as a result a kid was injured and possibly damaged for life… we really need to at the very least make training a requirement, even just a written exam would help…
All he had to go off was a vehicle with 2 teenagers inside and the call from his girlfriend that there were trespassers on the property. Depending on what exactly was said on the call and what happened between him blocking the vehicle in and the shot, he might just have shit trigger discipline and his girlfriend is the one who is super scared of anyone she sees on their security cameras.
You can’t train out the stupid.
I’ve taken regular gun safety classes. They’re less stringent than a driver’s ed class. It’s like taking the driver safety class after you’ve gotten a ticket. Yeah, yeah…let’s just get through this shit so I can get back to whatever.
I live in a state with an online training requirement and it’s a joke. The employees at sporting goods stores actually encouraged me to quickly click through to the end and print the results.
As someone who supports firearm ownership, I also believe it should require a background check, a thorough psychological evaluation, and equally thorough, in-person safety training and testing, all repeated periodically in order to maintain ownership.
we really need to at the very least make training a requirement, even just a written exam would help…
Cue gun nuts, “…shall not be infringed!”
Cue anyone sane: “Well-regulated.”
Clearly no gun problem in America
No
Well, there ya go. All the proof you need that there’s clearly no gun problem in America.
/s
Brent Metz is accused of shooting a 17-year-old in the face after the teenager trespassed on a property to find a homeowner and inquire about taking homecoming photos there. (Jackson County Sheriffs Office)
Trespassing? So walking to someones door looking for the owner of the house is now Trespassing? Wtf
Not a lawyer. By the letter of the law, yes.
They had to jump the fence - presumably the gate was secured - in order to get to the house. Further, they walked around the property looking for the owner. This looks to anyone without more knowledge, very much like trespassing.
Just my 2 cents, I’m not trying to defend or accuse anyone.
Not trying to but you literally did
No
Now hold on mate, just listing facts is not the same as an endorsement of a conclusion. The same can be said about NOT listing facts. All the information available should be presented to allow for informed opinions.
It doesn’t look like trespassing, it was trespassing, and particularly suspicious at that. If he’d shot him after they hopped the fence it’d be one thing, but that’s not what happened. He shot the kid after they’d gotten back in the car and left the property.
2 cents has different value around the world. To me yours currently is worth a lot.
The teen is recovering.
In case you were wondering
Thank you
Guy released from jail for $5000, after shooting teen in face for trespassing. Let that sink in.
The worst part is, having lived in Colorado, none of this story was surprising in the least.
I was going to say that “stand your ground” laws shouldn’t exist when so many people are terrified of shadows.
But that’s it isn’t it? If they’re terrified of shadows then a gun and a power fantasy is the answer.
This isn’t even stand your ground or castle doctrine or anything. The homeowner wasn’t even home and they were outside the front gate when shot. That’s the craziest part to me, absolutely no one was in danger until the dude showed up.
By the same government encouraging their armament. “Give them guns” and also “they’re coming for YOU so be afraid!”
That’s the conclusion of ‘bowling for columbine’.
And yet the GOP (mostly) either don’t give a fuck, have no moral courage, or are bought and paid for by the firearm industry. And then they use fear to keep their base glued to their propaganda machine and voting them into power on a loop.
Meanwhile the DNC keep trying to compromise as if both sides were still using the same playbook (which they ain’t) and have thus drifted so far to the right that they’re basically Republican lite. So much so that when progressives try to yank them back to their roots, the Republicrats resist and call the progressives “too extreme”.
Gawd I hate this quagmire.
What progressives?
And yet the GOP (mostly) either don’t give a fuck, have no moral courage, or are bought and paid for by the firearm industry.
D: all of the above
That dudes response is unhinged but trying to ask permission to take photos by hopping a gate to do it? That gate must have some kind of buzzer or like maybe come back later?
He said they parked outside the gate, hopped the fence and walked up the driveway to look for the homeowner, the sheriff’s office said in a news release.
I guess that’s a “no.”