I am not the most worldly individual, so perhaps the board could enlighten me. Looking over the highest death counts related to school shooting/bombings/arsons (I would surmise dead children are dead regardless of the method used) I need help understanding the social norms and the ability to own firearms in other countries, say Russia and Sri Lanka, and if that single issue is the causal agent of these school tragedies?
Do the unwashed masses in Russia get to keep AKs for personal protection? Could the Leftest here point to the easy access of evil assault rifles as the fault of the 338 killed and 783 injured at the Besian School in 2004?
Sri Lanka comes in at 3 of the highest number of decedents in the top 11, they seem to punch way above their weight in count. Do they allow fully automatic ARs to be owned by everyone?
I will digress for a moment and come back to the good 'ol USA for a moment and reference the worst of our killings at a school, (which used not a single firearm but rather explosives and fire to make the point of a pissed off politician) in 1927 when Andrew Kehoe killed 45 and injured an addition 58 by setting off gasoline and dynamite at a school because he lost an election. (He did blow himself up and saved the cost of a trial and execution)
The dictatorial governments of some nations have taken a decent toll of lives at schools over the decades, most notable among them Chile in 1907 when they capped over 2000 people at the Santa Maria School, granted it was not just students but families of protestors against the government in a labor dispute, and the army was the hammer, similar to the 1976 bloodbath in Thailand where an untold number of people were hung, burned, shot or beaten to death at the Thammasat University.
Of the highest body counts at schools it seems to be that Muslim extremism could be more of a repository of blame than firearms, given the Besian affair in Russia, and several in Pakistan, Kenya, Afghanistan and Indonesia. So called Christians are no slackers in school massacres, as evidenced by the Walisongo school killings in Indonesia in 2000 (70 deaths).
Perhaps it is the people involved and not some inanimate object that is responsible for all these atrocities?
