Comments

1
well, ban them for others, like young men in low-income urban neighborhoods. but i NEED mine. i'm special.

seriously - i'm glad this kid (only) had a knife.
2
I love you, Dan Savage, but I don't see America ever putting the gun genie back in the bottle. It will be interesting to see the local reaction, but I imagine it will be a pro-gun response. Murrysville is a part of PA that was very rural, and happy about it. I'm sure one in-law of mine will want all the staff at the school to be armed. No amount of discussion will change his mind.

I am happy that nobody perished, and hope everyone recovers.
3
I can't wait to see how stupid it gets here in the comments by the end of the day.
4
I don't believe in banning or that we can ban guns. It's just not a realistic approach. I'm all for keeping guns out of the hands of criminals and the mentally ill.
5
Yawn. I send my money dutifully to the NRA and the SAF and this is the current state of affairs:

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/arch…

Keep your head in the sand if you like
6
If only all the teachers were armed with machetes.
7
This is a terrible tragedy and now is not the time to discuss knife violence in America! Have you no shame?
8
@5 Jesus is totally ripped - looks like he would really know how to please a man. When you're jerking off to that picture, do you feel shame for all the precious seed you waste?
9
@2

You know we put the leaded gasoline genie back in the bottle? The smoking genie? The incandescent light bulb genie?

We've changed before, and we're in the midst of change now.
10
No shame, I put in in a jar that a Stranger intern picks up once per month, and then the entire Stranger staff use it for an orgiastic office felch.
11
My mom works at Forbes Regional, not in the E.R., though. I don't know any of these kids but this feels so close to home for me. I know the hospital, I know Murrysville and Franklin. I hope everyone recovers quickly and fully.

@2, while Murrysville is relatively rural it's only a 30 minute drive from downtown Pittsburgh. And I knew a lot of people who lived out there but worked in the city. "Really rural and happy about it" is not a description that I'd use.
12
Well, at least the ban on knives in schools worked out swimmingly. I'm sure a prohibition against guns being in the hands of known criminals will be equally effective.
13
Hey Dad, you are aware that some gun nuts are Democrats, right?

15
I'm not in favor of banning guns. I'm in favor of REGULATING their manufacture and ownership. But your average NRA member can't seem to tell the difference, the poor dear.
The other thing about guns vs knives is it's a lot harder to accidentally stab someone to death than accidentally shoot someone to death, because stabbing takes effort.
16
Lets do a quick comparison:
Columbine: 12 students and 1 teacher killed, 24 injured. Weapons of choice: pistols
Sandy Hook Elementary: 20 students and 6 teachers killed, 2 injured.
Weapon of choice: Bushmaster assault rifle. Most chilling fact, most victims were shot between 3 and 11 times. Imagine someone holding an assault rifle, pointing it at a group of 6 year olds and a teacher trying to shield them with her body, and pulling the trigger more than 60 times.
Franklin Regional Senior High School: 0 fatalities (praying it stays that way) and 20 injuries.
I sense a pattern here. Without guns, fatalities drop in school violence.
17
I'm glad you finally just came out of the closet and said it:
'So let's just go ahead and ban guns.'

No more disingenuous willy-nilly bullshit. Now we can have an honest discussion where everyone's motives are on the table.

Bravo, Dan. And I'm sincere when I say this.
18
what @15 said. I have no problem with firearms for huntin' (though I have a problem with what some people hunt). I want handguns regulated to hell and back, however.
19

Guns are not banned now in Pennsylvania so it wasn't like he was forced to use a knife by some regulation.

The only thing we can say is that we should train our rampage killers to freely go with a knife instead of a gun.

20
@9 Poor examples.

All those were technologies that were not completely banned. They were replaced with other technologies that served the same need.

We still have internal combustion, light bulbs, and cigarettes.

Your analogy would work if it was we about making safer guns with electronic tracking and trigger lock capabilities or some such. Not banning.

Because as history repeatedly proves prohibitions do not work unless the culture changes drastically to accept them. And we are no where near that yet with guns. Yet.

But. Hey. Go ahead and try to mount a "ban all guns" national political campaign. Get used to losing elections.
21
But Cody Spafford 'only' had a knife? Why did he have to die?
23
"So let's just go ahead and ban guns."

And you've just validated all the people you described as "gun nuts".
You've now stated that you do want to take their guns.
They already knew that you weren't interested in saving the children whose deaths you mock.
24
If there's a gun angle to a Hollandaise sauce recipe, The Stranger would find it.
25
@16 - I am not sure an EMT would agree that guns are more deadly than knives. No one has died *yet* knife wounds terrible things, the wounded could bleed out later. Ask people from the UK where stabbings are fairly common. or all the kids that died in the Chinese stabbings.
26
"The only thing we can say is that we should train our rampage killers to freely go with a knife instead of a gun."

Yes folks, JBITDMFOTP.
27
@15 - THANK YOU! Agreed. There's a huge difference between regulating and banning. And for 200 years, until Ronald Reagan started making federal judicial appointments, the federal courts agreed.
28

@23: I'm sorry, it takes a lot more than that to validate YOUR ignorant viewpoint, Mr. I-Deny-All-Evidence-That-Disagrees-With-Me. Wow great argument fagtron you sure convinced me with those hot opinions.

29
@28
My internet stalker who makes thinly veiled suggestions that I kill myself, you have been answered again and again. Japan and England contradict your claims. Both have high suicide rates and low gun ownership rates.

But then you believe that stalking someone is a rational response when disagreeing with them.
http://www.thestranger.com/slog/archives…
"I promise to stop stalking you if you leave The SLOG and never return."

"fagtron"

And?

I have an internet stalker.
And my internet stalker likes to make thinly veiled suggestions that I kill myself.
30
@29: Where's your evidence that I've ever suggested that you kill yourself?
31
@25

"Ask people from the UK where stabbings are fairly common."

I'm from the UK. I'm not sure what you mean by "fairly common". Most crimes involving knives in the UK involve possession and nothing more. In fact, in 2012 there were 4 times as many people arrested for possession of a knife or other offensive weapon than there were people treated for stab wounds in the UK.

Less than 5,000 people were treated for stabbings or wounds caused by sharp implements in UK hospitals in 2012. 550 people were murdered in the UK in the same year. 193 murders were committed using a knife or other sharp implement (this can include broken bottles and so on). This is from a population of over 60 million. By comparison, over 500 people were murdered in Chicago, population 2.7 million.
32
Cascadian Bacon better show up soon, or Phoebe will take home the prize for the most asinine comment of the day!
33
Hope you guys are having fun masturbating over that "gun control" that's never going to happen. If you ever decide to wake up from your fantasy world, let me know.
34
Every right comes with a price. The price of free speech is having to put up with people saying things you find offensive. The price of trial by jury is jury duty. The price of the right to bear arms is the risk of being shot.

In the case of free speech and trial by jury, I'd say the right is worth the price. In the case of the right to bear arms, it isn't. I dream of the day when the Second Amendment is repealed.
35
@25

To expand on my comment before, to look more closely at the supposed knife culture in the UK (something that is whipped up by the reactionary press using coded language about 'urban' youth in London):

In 2012 in the UK (population approx. 60 million), there were:

29,503 offences involving knives or other sharp instruments (this includes anything sharp; broken glass and screwdrivers are the most common).

4,490 hospital admissions for wounds caused by knives or other sharp instruments.

193 murders involving knives or other sharp instruments.

So, two-thirds of one percent of all crime in the UK involving knives or other sharp instruments results in death. And less than five percent of all hospital admissions in the UK for wounds caused by knives or other sharp instruments result in death.

In 2012, there were as many gun murders in the US every two-and-a-bit days than there were knife/sharp instrument murders in the UK in the entire year.

In summary, I believe that guns are more deadly than knives.

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