> Actually there's a huge physchological gap between shooting somebody and > thrusting a sword (or a knife for that matter) into somebody's flesh. > Same thing with nearly any strength-based weapon - you either have it in > you to take that kind of direct action or you don't. > > Many of the people that end up using a gun to kill would never be able > to smash a skull with a baseball bat or drive a knife into someone's > liver. A gun abstracts the action and distances the user from the > effect.
Possibly, possibly not. I mentioned before that I'd noticed the gory coverage of killings in UK papers. We all know that guns aren't as easy to come by in England, but people still seem to die. From those articles I've been reading, they often seem to involve bladed weapons or, more commonly, bludgeoning weapons like hammers and bats. And from the quite sanguine details in the papers, I can tell quite plainly that the acts were quite gruesome and intentional. No "hammer cleaning" accidents. (And yes, using the word "sanguine" was a pun.) I've talked about this with a friend of mine who speaks Japanese and reads the Japanese papers. Again, no guns but plenty of killing. Talking to him, where we would have a headline about someone being shot, they just replace the word and action "shot" with "strangled". And I don't think I've ever heard about accidental strangulation while hand washing. It appears that when people decide to kill, they are going to kill with or without a gun. That and IIRC, the majority of homicides are among closely related people and after that serious grudge is over, the likelyhood of another killing goes down. -Kevin ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Archives: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/index.cfm?forumid=5 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/index.cfm?method=subscribe&forumid=5 This list and all House of Fusion resources hosted by CFHosting.com. The place for dependable ColdFusion Hosting. Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5
