It doesn't look sarcastic to me. They are arguing that two random people fighting in the parking lot should be arrested but not treated like a columbine. That makes a lot of sense to me. It doesn't make sense to you?

The phrasing only sounds weird because you were (baselessly) implying they didn't care about that violence, so they had to directly state that they care in a super obvious way.

Their actual comment used the phrase

  "is orthogonal to schools or children having access to firearms."

which drained the sense and reason from their position.

Homeless vargrants gunfighting in the school carpark after dark will factually increase the odds of the first children the next day finding a scattered firearm with live ammunition from ZERO chance to SOME chance.

This negates the assertion of orthogonality.

Regardless, my only other comment to this submission still stands; it doesn't matter whether non student shootings on school grounds are included or not in country by country comparisons .. the USofA still "wins" a very hollow victory - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43155165

I think their argument is that a child is far more likely to get a gun by other means. Let's say 90% orthogonal instead of 100%.

Does it make sense in that light?

> it doesn't matter whether non student shootings on school grounds are included or not in country by country comparisons

Sure. But I think we should strive toward accurate categorization in reporting.

Sure.

The US has a lot of gun play within school boundaries. Most of that (see pie chart) involves students. Some of it doesn't.

Other countries have near zero gun play on school grounds.

That appears accurate.