The reason owning weapons is illegal in China is the reason it is legal here. The Chinese government didn't implement gun control laws because it cares about the well being of it's citizens, but because people are easier to oppress and abuse when they lack the means to strike back.
I know its an obvious message, but I think people take for granted that this country would not exist if not for firearms, which is why the right to bear arms is in the Bill of Rights. Some people say that the founding fathers could not have imagined a future in which gun ownership isn't necessary, but why do those same people find it so impossible to imagine a future in which it is? If you want to murder a man you can use a knife. If you want to resist invaders or a corrupt government you need guns (and more).
I think the thing that bothers me most about this debate is that most of the gun control advocates are forced to admit that their "solutions" would not have prevented this man from carrying out an attack (I guess the others live in some fantasy world where men who are unhinged and determined enough to shoot their own mothers in the face, slaughter elementary school children and their teachers and then kill themselves will be deterred by a little red tape) and yet, despite these admissions they seem unwilling to even address the actual cause of these massacres. I think its partly because having a knee jerk "BAN ________" reaction is easier than examining exactly how men can be driven to the point where they are capable of committing such atrocities.
The examples from China are important because they show that such incidents are not unique to our "gun obsessed culture" and that the lack of available firearms does not prevent such incidents. In fact, China has had a rash of these attacks, like this one http://behindthewall.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/09/21/14014789-ax-wielding-man-kills-3-kids-wounds-13-in-china?lite . Someone should tell the parents of those children they were lucky the guy used an axe and not a gun.
The sad thing is that the article I linked says that the incidents in China have inspired a movement for mental health reform. Perhaps, it is because they don't have debates over guns, music and violent video games clouding the issue.
In America and Europe the men who perpetrate these attacks use guns, in China they use knives and axes, but the one thing they all have in common is mental illness.