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Many Dead In Virginia Tech Shooting
nexuspal writes "Over 20 confirmed dead at Virginia Tech. Shooter killed some at residence hall then two hours later killed others in classrooms. Worst school shooting in US history. "
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What fucked up animals we are. I wish well to all affected by this.
See headline. Check favorite news outlets, or see the developing story, including people monitoring scanners, several students posting live in the thread, and people grappling with the various sources of information in this Fark thread.
ACs are modded -6. I don't read you, I don't mod you, I don't see you. Don't like it? Don't be a coward.
I'm a gaming and simulation design engineering major.
I really hope they don't find any way to blame this on video games, like most school shootings.
I was at the University of Arizona Nursing School shootings in 2001, and know what the folks over at VTech are going through.
My thoughts are with you, your loved ones and for this world, which every day seems to spin more out of control.
Message contains 1 attachment: spam.gif
Worst shooting spree of *any* kind. 31 dead, latest count. How he got away with it again, two hours later, is a question many will be asking.
...the future crusty old bastards are already drinking the Kool-Aid.
In case anyone has missed it, Jack Thompson has already gone on the major news networks predicting that the shooter's computer will have Counterstrike installed.
How the hell does Jacko correlate the skill of properly aiming and discharging a firearm with moving a thumbstick and pressing a button on a control-pad? There is no link there!
Listen Jack, just because your addled mind cannot disassociate video games from reality doesn't mean that the rest of us can't either. For fuck sake, the bodies aren't even COLD yet, we have no idea who the shooter is, and already you're exploiting this situation to try to push your illogical and ultimatly incorrect agenda?
You are a sick, sick man Jacko. Human filth. The only person worse than you in this situation is the shooter, but at least he had the decency to get killed.
My heart goes out to the victims of this tragedy, but right now I can't help but feel only rage at the baseless lies and unabashed opportunism displayed by this man.
There is no mod option "-1: Disagree" for a reason. "Overrated" is not an acceptable substitute. Post something instead.
So far, 32 dead they say including him...they said he was an oriental fellow, with a vest on, and lots of ammo strapped to him.
Any word if he was an engineering student that may have snapped or anything?
Sad day...
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
link. My question/concern is why did the police not lock down the campus after the shooting in the residence hall. 2 hours later, the SAME shooter went into classrooms and started killing students. If this is indeed the case, I believe it was gross negligence on the part of the police and I would be very disturbed if I was a family member of one of the students killed in the second shooting.
I've read Slashdot for the last 5 years, and now I start posting... Go figure
This is why it is wrong for your second amendment rights to end at the boundary of a school. Nothing is preventing from people illegally bringing guns on to campus. The same argument applies, well, anywhere.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Have some friends in the area, so our usual gang was trying to figure out what was up.
From what I heard they put all schools in the county into lockdown when the attack was detected - not just college campuses. The gunman is apparently dead, but obviously everyone is extremely nervous.
Apparently the campus had had bomb threats in the last two weeks. No idea if they're connected:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18134671/
My thoughts are with the lost and their loved ones.
"The Sage treasures Unity and measures all things by it" - Lao Tzu
He was on Fox around 3:15 Eastern (I think. Time may be off), almost in tears talking about how HL2, GTA, and the others prepared the guy for violence - notwithstanding his name hasn't even been released yet.
ACs are modded -6. I don't read you, I don't mod you, I don't see you. Don't like it? Don't be a coward.
I submitted this story as well, and in my summary I stated that this being a tech site, there are probably a lot of virginia tech students alumni in the readership, and therefore it is appropriate to post this on /.
This whole incident makes me sick to my stomach, and my thoughts/prayers go out to the families and victims.
I got nothin'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spree_killing
Worst school shooting in American history. So far this body count hasn't even reached the top 3 spree killings in history, all of which fyi weren't inside the USA. Wikipedia also has a disturbing play-by-play of the Australian Port Arthur massacre that is truly horrifying to read.
Yes, because criminals respect the law! [/sarcasm]
Right, because there's no way this guy could have killed 30 people without a gun (say, with a bomb, or something)... No way he could have gotten a gun if they were against the law... etc.
How many fewer people in that classroom would have died if one of the students in the room was carrying?
Best to respond to tragedy with a knee-jerk revocation of civil liberties.
The "firearms" cat is out of the bag. You can't undo technology with laws. Readers of this site should know that better than most people.
Yeah, this sucks. I lived in AJ. As a CS major (and grad student), I had classes in Norris. I spent a lot of time there in general (thanks to various club activities). As the numbers keep growing and growing, it just becomes more and more shocking, yet numbing at the same time.
That said, everytime the press says, "This has set a new record in campus killings", I want to throttle someone.
-- jchenx
http://www.judicial.vt.edu/upsl.php
10. Fireworks/Explosives/Hazardous Chemicals/Weapons
Unauthorized possession or use of fireworks, explosives, or weapons is prohibited. Hazardous chemicals that could pose a health risk are also prohibited from the campus, including chemicals that, when combined with other substances, could be hazardous or present a danger to others.
Unauthorized possession, storage (in vehicles on campus as well as in the residence halls), or control of firearms and weapons on university property is prohibited. (NOTE: Organizational weapons of the Virginia Tech Corps of Cadets, approved by the commandant, are not prohibited by this policy.) Firearms are defined as any gun, rifle, pistol, or handgun designed to fire bullets, BBs, pellets, or shots (including paint balls), regardless of the propellant used. Other weapons are defined as any instrument of combat or any object not designed as an instrument of combat but carried for the purpose of inflicting or threatening bodily injury. Examples include (but are not limited to) knives with fixed blades or pocket knives with blades longer than four inches, razors, metal knuckles, blackjacks, hatchets, bows and arrows, nun chahkas, foils, or any explosive or incendiary device. Possession of realistic replicas of weapons on campus is prohibited. Students who store weapons in residence hall rooms, who brandish weapons, or who use a weapon in a reckless manner may face disciplinary action which may include suspension or dismissal from the university.
Refer to Section V.W. for additional information about Weapons.
Er.. aren't there some stories that transcend the typical boundaries of the Slashdot? What did we do on 9/11? The fallout of this event will affect student civil liberties all over America. Once the "we gotta do *something*" people take over, it's going to get spectacularly ugly. After they find his My Space page, this might even become a YRO issue. This is *very* relevant.
He probably trained on Doom. Someone check to see if he was able to aim up and down.
Bad joke, but one has to wonder. Especially with hollywood seemingingly taking an increasingly cavalier attitude about putting hardcore violence in films. A lot of what is passing for R these days would have gotten NC-17 ten years ago. I bet the movie grindhouse tanks this weekend.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
And still you fight for your right to bear arms
(Score:2, Offtopic)
Take this as (another) wake up call. Vote for the candidate that promise to reform your gun control laws in '08.
Yeah, existing laws - making it illegal to walk on campus with a gun and shoot 30+ people - really did a lot of good, no? What makes you think passing more laws is going to help?
Something like this actually makes me MORE determined than ever to fight for my 2nd Amendment rights. You can do whatever the fuck you want if some nut with a gun shows up and starts trying to kill you, but I want to be able to defend myself. I may not succeed, but at least I won't go out cowering under a desk, praying to a god that does not exist, that the killer won't find me.
// TODO: Insert Cool Sig
As horrifying as this sickening act of violence is, it's sobering to recognize that this kind of random death toll is practically a daily event in Baghdad. We should be equally shocked and horrified by that.
Thoughts and prayers for all victims of violence.
-- http://frobnosticate.com
IMO you're right. But that's not the point.
It's too soon, and the wounds are too fresh.
Right now, my heart goes out to the families of those killed, and prayers that the injured all recover.
Let the political arguments, the gun control and video game fights, and even the Jon Katz stories just wait until later.
-Matt
I bet a lot of people feel safe in a country where you can be Tasered with impunity if you forget your library card, make a fuss in your library and refuse to leave, however this "security" that is supposed to prevent this kind of crap has no effect whatsoever. Or could it be that this security that is shoved down our throats isn't really designed to prevent this stuff at all?
Yet another example of how most security is MAKE BELIEVE, and apart from keeping the sheep in line and obedient, it does absolutely nothing to prevent the REAL crime. I wouldn't be surprised to learn that the security guards were hiding - probably behind the students.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Wish I still had points.
I am also very surprised, and glad, to read that most comments have focused on "what a sick fuck" vs. "guns r bad mmmkay?"
-- My Sig is a P228.
Jack Thompson will blame video games, Jerry Falwell will blame gay marriage, Rosie O'Donnel will say it is the proliferation of guns, Rush Limbaugh will tell us that this is the inevitable result of a a Democrat majority. This is how these people get their faces on TV.
I don't even think it is seen as grotesque by most people any more.
"Sacrifice for the good of The State" - The State
The term is Asian, not Oriental.
Quote the head: Stuff That Matters. 31 killed on a College campus, a majority in a EE/CS building, well, it just damn Matters.
"For years, I struggled with reality... but I'm happy to say I finally won out over it." -- Elwood P. Dowd
Yes, "extremely low": 14 dead in UofT shootings. Good job that all those who kept the shooter pinned down did not turn around and started shooting everybody at random. Get real, man - if everyone around you carries guns and automatic rifles, then don't be surprised that once in a while something like this happens. If this guy had only access to knives and similar things, he could've killed 2-3 people at most, but not 32. What an insane country. Next time we'll hear about another "record"...
Well look at the UK. We've had one such incident in history, commited by a man lisenced to carry arms. He killed 17. In England this has never happened.
While it's true that some people are insane and will go to silly lengths to cause destruction (think 9/11), most crimes of this kind are carried by "ordinary guys". That are very few criminal masterminds. Thousands that have a bad day, get dumped by their girlfriend or loose everything on red. Arm them when they're sane of mind and watch the destruction when they're not.
That's the American way.
Mod this comment up - incredibly important point. You know this image? http://www.foxnews.com/photoessay/photoessay_1642_ images/0416071259_M_041607_shooting1.jpg
Yeah, that was just a reporter. He was released.
Does anybody know if Virginia Tech has a policy against firearms on campus?
Gun bill gets shot down by panel
Tuesday, January 31, 2006
Virginia Tech spokesman Larry Hincker was happy to hear the bill was defeated. "I'm sure the university community is appreciative of the General Assembly's actions because this will help parents, students, faculty and visitors feel safe on our campus."
http://www.roanoke.com/news/roanoke/wb/wb/xp-5065
I see a lot of gun control comments already...I am interested, what is your solution?
As I recall it only took a couple of guys with some simple box cutters to kill 3000+ people, so what would
a gun ban do?
Got Code?
Every time a news of shooting breaks out, I always wonder why the possession of firearms is not banned entirely in this country. I am native of Japan, and where I grew up nobody but cops were allowed to carry guns. I live in New Jersey now, and I really miss a sense of security I used to have back home. Back there I never worried about getting killed and such, whereas I feel physically threatened where I live now since there have been a number of incidents of armed robberies on campus at Rutgers and in my neighborhood. (My own apartment was robbed several years ago, too.) Seriously, it makes a huge difference when I have to take into consideration the possibility of the possession of firearms when some strangers attacked me. I am aware that there are gun lobbies working against the ban of firearms, but it never made any sense to me. Could anybody enlighten me as to why people want to carry guns at all?
I suppose the usual gun control debates will ensue, along with the bashing of video games. But none of that really matters. The real question is why did this guy shoot all of these people? What made him so angry/hopeless that he felt the need to commit this mass murder? And the more chilling question in my mind is, why doesn't this sort of thing happen more often? There's a lot of pain and ugliness in the world, more than enough to produce thousands, if not millions of shooters. And perhaps therein lies the hope. As bad as things can be, they haven't reached the point where these mass shootings happen every day. Will we be wise enough to do the things we really need to do to prevent this from happening again?
To the making of books there is no end, so let's get started
That makes sense. I'll vote for the candidate who promises to grant me the right to carry a concealed firearm anywhere I wish, across all states of the nation, because that individual understands the second amendment.
Oh wait, you think I should be against guns? Perhaps you should wake up and realize that the US was founded on the idea of personal freedom, while the UK was founded upon the principle of a monarchy. The UK was disarmed much earlier and people would stand for that shit. Today there are vastly more guns than people in the US. You'll never get rid of them all. And there are an absolute crapload of gunsmiths here. One person I know showed me a submachine gun he built himself. It is a truism that if you outlaw guns, only outlaws will have guns.
There are less guns and less of a gun mentality in the UK, and that was true from the start. But here in the US, it was formerly considered every citizen's responsibility to own a gun, for two purposes. One, to protect us from fascism. Well, that hasn't worked. But Two, to provide for the defense of the nation. Disarmed countries are easy to control.
And on that note, I leave you with the following quotation: "Among the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will look upon the Act depriving a whole nation of arms as the blackest..." --Mahatma Gandhi
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I'm actually agreeing with drinkypoo! Perhaps if just one of the law-abiding citizens involved had been armed, much of this would have been avoided...
It sounds counter-intuitive to many, but here's a study which supports your position:
Multiple Victim Public Shootings, Bombings, and Right-to-Carry Concealed Handgun Laws: Contrasting Private and Public Law Enforcement
JOHN R. LOTT Jr.
State University of New York - Department of Economics
WILLIAM M. LANDES
University of Chicago Law School; National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)
Few events obtain the same instant worldwide news coverage as multiple victim public shootings. These crimes allow us to study the alternative methods used to kill a large number of people (e.g., shootings versus bombings), marginal deterrence and the severity of the crime, substitutability of penalties, private versus public methods of deterrence and incapacitation, and whether attacks produce copycats. Yet, economists have not studied this phenomenon. Our results are surprising and dramatic. While arrest or conviction rates and the death penalty reduce normal murder rates, our results find that the only policy factor to influence multiple victim public shootings is the passage of concealed handgun laws. We explain why public shootings are more sensitive than other violent crimes to concealed handguns, why the laws reduce both the number of shootings as well as their severity, and why other penalties like executions have differential deterrent effects depending upon the type of murder.
Being a tech school, I'm sure there are a lot of Slashdot readers that are fellow VT alumni (like myself).
There is, unfortunately, a lot that might ultimately be connected to topics that are normally associated with Slashdot:
- Might this be a disgrunted engineering (including comp sci) student? (Pressure thanks to exams, weed-out classes, etc.)
- As a possible engineering student, it's extremely likely he/she plays video games, so unfortunately that gives opportunity for anti-gaming advocates to thump their chests
- Possible that gun-control (or lack thereof) may have affected this?
For now though, I think it's too early to start the speculation. I hate how people are already using this awful tragedy to promote their own opinions/ideas. There will eventually be a time for this. Today, is not such a time.
-- jchenx
You are an idiot. Students wouldn't have been able to "pin down" the UT tower shooter unless they were carrying rifles in their school packs. You think a handgun has that kind of range? The death toll was so low because he was sniping at distant targets, not spraying bullets w/ a semi-automatic.
When what is believed to be a single, isolated shooting in a dorm happens on a 2600 acre public, open campus with hundreds of buildings, you can't assume that you're about to have the worst shooting incident (of any type) in US history.
Yet, people are already blaming Virginia Tech.
Would we close or "lock down" a city of 40000 people if there was a shooting? Because that's exactly what a campus of this size and type is (including students and faculty/staff).
No, but people are already calling for siren/PA systems in EVERY of HUNDREDS of buildings, of varying ages and constructions, centralized door locking/control and camera systems for not just outer building doors, but ALL doors.
The University reacted in a reasonable way. Yes, a shooter was "on the loose". Someone who had shot a person in a dorm, and the University immediately sent out notifications that such an event occurred; to be cautious and aware, and to report any suspicious activity to campus police. The area was "locked down", but after over two hours elapsed, there was no reason to believe that a madman was about to go on a random killing spree across campus.
This is not an elementary school. This is not a high school. This is a massive, open research campus with tens of thousands of people spreading over 2600 acres, with private, residential, and other buildings intermixed.
The only person to be blamed here is the shooter. And yes, he's dead. But Virginia Tech is not at fault.
> Thoughts go the the families.
And to karma-whores, for the sort of pointless statement you get on local TV coverage of this sort of thing.
33 confirmed deaths now.
2 at the first shooting, and 31 at the second shooting.
I used to work at the Inn at Virginia Tech.
He got away with it *both* times because the law emasculates the citizen from carrying a weapon at all times.
And it was the Hokie adminstration that led the charge to dis-arm the students and the faculty:
right, because if we had the right to chicken arms, nobody would ever shoot anyone else...
and though it has been mentioned in 100 places in this thread already, if someone really wants to go on a shooting spree, no LAW is going to stop them.
I'm not meaning to preach, but what historical indicators are you using to base this on? What exactly about this makes you think that our current system ended this any better? What makes you think it would have been 33 instead of 32 if it had been harder for the shooter to get a gun?
Here you go...
Multiple Victim Public Shootings, Bombings, and Right-to-Carry Concealed Handgun Laws: Contrasting Private and Public Law Enforcement
JOHN R. LOTT Jr.
State University of New York - Department of Economics
WILLIAM M. LANDES
University of Chicago Law School; National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)
Abstract:
Few events obtain the same instant worldwide news coverage as multiple victim public shootings. These crimes allow us to study the alternative methods used to kill a large number of people (e.g., shootings versus bombings), marginal deterrence and the severity of the crime, substitutability of penalties, private versus public methods of deterrence and incapacitation, and whether attacks produce copycats. Yet, economists have not studied this phenomenon. Our results are surprising and dramatic. While arrest or conviction rates and the death penalty reduce normal murder rates, our results find that the only policy factor to influence multiple victim public shootings is the passage of concealed handgun laws. We explain why public shootings are more sensitive than other violent crimes to concealed handguns, why the laws reduce both the number of shootings as well as their severity, and why other penalties like executions have differential deterrent effects depending upon the type of murder.
JT's immediate bandwagon jumping, shows him for the c**t that he really is. There is no other explanation. The guy is a scumbag, a slimey, bottom feeding piece of trash ready to exploit any tragedy for his own personal agenda.
Civilian firefights are not going to solve the problem unless you get people to wear good guy/bad guy armbands or something.
Sure, there are a few times, like perhaps this one, where a few lives might have been saved if someone had been armed, but there would likely have been more single event shootings (fight over a girl getting out of hand etc). When you work the averages, gun toting adds up to more deaths.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
Every time a news of shooting breaks out, I always wonder why the possession of firearms is not banned entirely in this country. I am native of Japan, and where I grew up nobody but cops were allowed to carry guns. I live in New Jersey now, and I really miss a sense of security I used to have back home. Back there I never worried about getting killed and such, whereas I feel physically threatened where I live now since there have been a number of incidents of armed robberies on campus at Rutgers and in my neighborhood. (My own apartment was robbed several years ago, too.) Seriously, it makes a huge difference when I have to take into consideration the possibility of the possession of firearms when some strangers attacked me. I am aware that there are gun lobbies working against the ban of firearms, but it never made any sense to me.
Because in this country we - historically - believe in certain inalienable rights of all men; and that includes - in addition to the phrase "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness" - the idea that individuals (or groups of individuals joined together for a common good) can defend those rights, using violence if necessary. Now no sane person *wants* violence or war, or bloodshed, but our Founding Fathers acknowledged that sometimes you have to choose to utilized armed forced in order to defend your "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness." Case in point, the US Revolutionary War.
And to this day, US citizens generally understand that if the government ever becomes tyrannical and repressive, "we the people" have the right (and must have the means) to overthrow it.
Could anybody enlighten me as to why people want to carry guns at all?
Because there is no way to prevent crazy nuts like this guy from VT from getting guns. And some people want to be able to defend themselves when these nuts show up and start shooting.
// TODO: Insert Cool Sig
The shallow analysis is that this guy was insane, a random nutcase, but this is the Nth time it's happened in the US. Why isn't the same thing happening in other countries? What is it about American society which creates these young men who have so little to lose?
Deleted
Does anybody know if Virginia Tech has a policy against firearms on campus? If so, I hope people stop and ask: could one student, armed with a handgun, have prevented the death toll from climbing as high as it did?
Last year the VA legislature tried to amend the laws to allow licensed students and faculty to carry concealed on campus. Virginia Tech spokesman Larry Hincker was happy to hear the bill was defeated. "I'm sure the university community is appreciative of the General Assembly's actions because this will help parents, students, faculty and visitors feel safe on our campus."
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
Oriental just means Eastern. It's not offensive. It's a little imprecise, but it isn't really used to mean anything other than East Asia. Asian isn't a good term to use for East Asian because Asia is a big continent, encompassing the Middle East and much of Russia as well as the areas usually referred to by Oriental. People who would use Oriental as some sort of insult are just as capable of using Asian in the same manner.
Ever been in a firefight? Because if you haven't, I can assure you that having a gun doesn't make you grow a big, brass pair all of a sudden.
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
Look at the fucking timestamps. When I started my comment there were 0 comments in this story.
I have my own mind and can make it up on my own. Welcome to my foes list.
The Libertarians' website thingy tells me that I am an upper left centrist. Make of that what you will.
Accusing people who don't agree with you of following someone else's agenda is a sorry excuse for an actual debate. Mudslinging is easy, but it still makes you look like an ass.
Fact: Some guy shot a bunch of people.
Fact: You are not permitted to carry guns on campus.
Fact: Someone with a gun would have been in a better position to shoot the shooter than someone without a gun. In fact, once the event was confirmed, they called some men with guns and those men came and shot the man shooting people.
Fact: You are making stupid assumptions. One of them is that he had no facts before you did.
Ah yes, compare me to Rush in order to discredit me. That will work fine on the idiot sheeple who respond predictably to such stimulus. But it will not work on rational individuals who are not afraid to make up their own minds.
Also, if Rush takes the same stance on carrying firearms, then I am not afraid to stand up and be counted as someone who agrees with him on the individual point, because issues and people are different things. Congratulations on being a sheep who does not understand this, and who even attempts to use that confusion to paint me as intolerant.
Never mind that denying someone their constitutional rights is what's genuinely intolerant here.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I'm shocked by the number of people on here calling for more guns in schools. That's horrible!
If you feel it necessary to carry a lethal weapon in order to feel safe, something is very very wrong.
Yeah, great. Let's visit this alternative reality for a minute. Word goes out that a 'young guy with a handgun' is wandering around campus killing people. In response, all these students break out their handguns and start popping off at anyone matching that description. Hilarity ensues.
Sorry, I'm not willing to give up my freedom for the illusion of safety. We have enough of that going on over here already, thanks.
Slashdot - where whining about luck is the new way to make the world you want.
Warren Ellis did an issue of Hellblazer about school shootings (which DC then didn't publish). You can find the pages available here. I highly, highly recommend reading it - I feel it has serious insight into at least one aspect of why these things happen.
The scan is a bit blurry, and the server is having some trouble right now (404's - just hit refresh and it'll fix itself). If anyone can mirror it on a better server it would be appreciated.
Breaking Into the Industry - A development log about starting a game studio.
Yeah like they all know kung foo right?
Are they looking any better to you guys in the US yet? Seriously, this needn't have happened.
If by "gun laws" you mean the laws, regulations and statutes that create Defenseless Victim Zones like
Virginia Tech, then no, they're not looking any better.
// TODO: Insert Cool Sig
Michael Moore's 'Bowling for Columbine' documentary looked into this and didn't actually blame the ready availability of guns in the US for the high level of gun crime. He showed examples of other countries where lots of people carry guns, such as Canada and Switzerland, countries that don't have such a culture of violence. He claims that a culture of fear is what drives Americans to arm themselves to the teeth in such big numbers, and you end up with the ludicrous situation where you can go into a shop on just about any high street and buy an automatic assault weapon, something that is not needed for self defence or hunting or any of the other uses that gun advocates frequently come up with.
There seems to be a cultivation of fear, where violent crime seems to get a disproportionate amount of coverage on the news that's way beyond the actual importance of it. So there was an armed robbery at the gas station earlier this morning. Do we really need a live outside broadcast from the scene of the crime at 7pm where all the activity has long finished?
On the radio this morning someone made a very good point about people in their neighbourhood driving their children the short distance to school for fear of abduction, even though the number of abductions in that area in the last ten years is zero. TV shows talk about an 'epidemic' of road rage, an epidemic being five reported incidents in the country in the last year. Remember the SARS outbreak? About five people in Asia died from it and it was reported as a 'worldwide pandemic.'
I don't know if gun control is the complete solution to the problem, it runs much deeper than that, but it has to be part of it. There's no way any random person should be able to walk in off the street and buy an AK47.
Drill baby drill - on Mars
I really think it is inappropriate to turn this into a political question so soon, but since you ask, I will give a very simple response.
First, firearms are not banned in this country because the founders of our country believed that everyone should have a reasonable right to defend themselves.
Second, take a look at Japan. Don't you think there are some fundamental differences in Japanese society and culture versus the U.S.? Are swords banned in Japan? I think a sword could do plenty of damage. Are cars legal in Japan? Cars kill infinitely more people than guns every single day.
Murder has nothing to do with the tools used. It is a society problem.
My simple opinion.
I express my deepest sympathies to all those involved at Virginia Tech today.
Vote Libertarian
Guns make people safer! That's why America, with the highest guns per capita of any first-world nation, is the safest nation on Earth, right alongside such sterling examples of crime-free zones like Costa Rica and Colombia.
Get a goddamned grip. The US has more guns -- and more gun deaths -- than any other developed nation.
Clearly the solution to today's situation would have been for everyone to have guns, then people could have started firing recklessly into the fray and that would have been really fucking great!
mirrorshades radio -- darkwave, industrial, futurepop, ebm.
nonsense. If anyone on this board should know about the events around August 1, 1966, it's me. Students didn't have weapons and weren't firing back at Whitman. He was up there for an hour and a half, taking his time.
Did the gun sprout legs and arms and go beserk??
No, but out of curiosity I wonder what kind of weapon and or training the person had. This is the highest body count any mass murder has had on a rampage in the states.
The only higher World Wide (at least so far) was the Port Arthur Massacre with 35 deaths who used an AR-10 rifle.
I'm not pro or anti gun, but you simply can't go on a mass murdering spree like this with a knife or a bow and arrow.
"I am the king of the Romans, and am superior to rules of grammar!"
-Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor (1368-1437)
Flamebait? So young people ARE allowed to express aggression and exhuberance? Because I haven't noticed.
The last part was one of these, I think:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dichotomy
Or it was one of these (2b):
http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/conundrum
And it makes people feel like one of these:
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/hypocrite
Please stop stalking me, bro.
Because anything can be a weapon. Surely someone from Japan would understanding that a ban on guns just causes other weapons to become more important. Why do you think the Samurai class continued to have power into the 20th century? Because they were behind the ban on guns. Their choice of weapon required their level of training, so it was not available to the general public. A gun makes everyone equally powerful, so you can't have Samurai pushing people around. (of course, the Samurai ethics, just like the knight's code of honor, served to prevent the worst abuses.)
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
I think that the point is: how the hell could be so easy for anybody to get such arsenal?!
ABC is reporting that it was 2 semi-automatic pistols. Hardly an asrenal.
Because there is no way to prevent crazy nuts like this guy from VT from getting guns. And some people want to be able to defend themselves when these nuts show up and start shooting.
Oh, I agree. I mean, it's not like the US has seen far far more of these sorts of killings than any other nation. And you know why? Because of the high level of gun ownership, of course. It is these very weapons that have prevented these sorts of things from happening time and again.
Right?
Here's a goodie:
Associated Press, 07/21/06
State: TN
Chris Cope said it was "like something in a serial killer movie," at a Memphis, Tenn., shopping center where he manages a financial services office. According to police, a store employee began stabbing co-workers after a work dispute. The attacker had already stabbed eight people and was chasing a ninth when Cope ran to his truck to retrieve his 9 mm pistol. "[The suspect] just kept saying, 'I'm insane. I wish I was never born,' and all that stuff," Cope said. But apparently the crazed man valued his life more than he let on. "When he turned around and saw my pistol, he threw the knife away, put his hands up and got on the ground," Cope said. "He saw my gun and that was pretty much it."
====
Find your own with this searchable archive:
http://www.nraila.org/ArmedCitizen/Default.aspx
Sounds like somebody has a case of the Mondays!
Well, for one thing it is cultural to some degree. I grew up in the south east (north central FL) and was around guns fairly regularly. I'm comfortable with them. Shoot, going out to a range with a friend and a box of 22 rounds can be a nice way to pass an afternoon. They do make it easier for one person to kill another, and especially for something like this to happen, but banning them doesn't mean the crazies won't find another way. No reason this couldn't have been a suicide bomber because you can't ban all the combinations of chemicals that can be made into such devices.
Another thing to remember is that guns have a great equalizing effect. Sure, the thug could pull a gun and kill you, but you have the ability to do the same. In this country even someones grandmother could be carrying a handgun in the big purse. She might even know how to use it. Firearms do put power in the hands of weaker people that they wouldn't have otherwise. Take a big guy who discovers he can get what he wants through force, now give the victim a firearm, big dude is less dangerous.
And let's go to the last/best argument. The cat is out of the bag. Guns are scattered through our country now. If you banned them it would have little if any effect in the short or medium term. Well, the black market value would probably go up, and law abiding citizens would be more unarmed, but neither of those is good. They've been such a part of our culture for so long that removing them now just isn't a viable option. Shoot, I know a number of law abiding citizens that just wouldn't give them up, let alone criminals.
Personally, I have very little problem with concealed carry laws. One day I may carry a gun myself. Unlikely, but I don't have a feeling of disgust about it. That said, I think people should have some very good training, regular re-examinations, psychological testing, etc. before they are allowed to carry.
We don't have the right to bare arms here in the UK per se, but I just do it anyway. Too hot for long sleeves.
Last year, a bill that would have allowed concealed carry on the Virginia Tech Campus was killed off in committee.
If that bill had passed, there is a chance this could have been curtailed.
Strangely enough, the killer did not seem to mind breaking the law in this regard.
If guns were banned in America tomorrow, do you HONESTLY think guns will just "go away"? Tens of thousands of illegal aliens cross the border monthly. Tons of illegal drugs enter the country regularly. Laws are in place banning both of those. All restrictive gun laws do is create a safe environment for violent criminals.
But, why do I bother? You can look up both sides of the issue and make your own mind up. But, please do look at BOTH sides of the issue. Contrary to what you might hear otherwise, there really are two sides.
Students have enough problems with getting to class on time and making terrible decisions with the largest deadliest weapons at their disposal: motor vehicles.
It doesn't take too much imagination to envision the mayhem with them carrying firearms and making decisions about shooting them.
[Disclaimer: I'm against weapons for "personal defense"]
A few years ago, there were two guys at my door attempting to break in. They lunged into the door so hard, that I was almost certain they would break in. It was pretty scary, because the only weapon I had was a big kitchen knife. Anyway, they failed to break the door in, but after they left, the 911 operator didn't want to send police over, because, well, they were gone. The police didn't even bother to come by and take finger prints (the thugs tried the door knob to see if it was unlocked). I live in Los Angeles. I'm not against weapons for "personal defense". If I had a shot gun, I could have calmly waited for them to knock the door in, and picked them off as they entered. There's a different perspective for you.
re:"The US is the most free country in the world, and with those liberties unfortunately come with consequences but in the end it's always better to be free."
Which is also why we average a war every 20 years - or more. Democracy works and is perfect! And if that doesn't work - we've got nukes. So there!
Illusion of safety? You mean, like the illusion that owning a handgun will somehow protect you from violence? Or the illusion that, in a truly violent situation, you will have the wherewithal to use your gun safely and effectively?
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, "orient" is defined as, "the countries of the East, especially east Asia."
Therefore, an "oriental" person would be someone of the countries of the East, especially East Asia.
Therefore, the word is correct, so stop your arguing.
I agree with the right to bear arms, what I don't agree with is the right to bear fully automatic weapons. I truly don't think this would have been possible with a asaiilant carrying only a shotgun or a hunting rifle.
According to initial reports the shooter was just armed with a couple of 9mm handguns.
This is the unedited transcript of the VT afternoon press conference at about 4:45 PM ET. Next press conference will be at 7:30 PM ET:
- I am vice president for university relations. We will begin this with a short statement by the president. All of the individuals will be available for comment. The president will identify him in his opening comments. We will stay here as long as you need us to. Afterwards, i will be available for comment. Obviously, there are an awful lot of you and there is one of me. I would recommend that we try to get as much as we can accomplish in this press briefing today.
- Thank you. Just a few minutes ago , i spoke with president bush and he conveyed his concern and condolences for everyone in washington and offered all of the help that they could possibly provide. I' ve also spoken with the governor who was coming back from tokyo. He has declared a state of emergency which allows us to access significant oth er assets at that will be required to do with this tragedy. With me today is the secretary for public service for the commonwealth of virginia, john marshall, and the superintendent for the virginia state police. Also is the mayor of b lacksburg, the chief of the blacksburg police department and the chief of the virginia tech police. I want to repeat my horror and disbelief and profound sorrow at the events of today. People from around the world have expressed their shock and their sorrow. I am really at a loss for words to explain or understand the carnage that has visited our campus. I know no other way to speak about this than to tell you what we now. It is now confirmed that we have at 31 deaths from the norris hall , including the gunman. 15 Other victims are being treated at hospitals. There are two confirmed deaths from the shooting in the dormitory, in addition to those at norris hall. We' ve not confirmed the activity of the gun man because he carried no at the dedication. We are in the process of attempting a dedication identification. We are in the proces s of notifying next of kin. This will take some time. We will not release any names unti l we are positive of this edification. We anticipate being able to release a list sometime tomorrow. We' re asking our students to contact their parents and let them know their status. Our investigation continues into whether there is a connection between the first and second incidents. That has not been decided. We know that the parents will want to embrace their children. We are not suggesting that you come to campus, however, if pa rents feel that it must come to campus, we are locating counselors at the end of virginia tech to be available. As you can imagine, security, investigation, operational, and counseling resources are very taxed at this moment. However, we are getting assistance from the state police, the fbi, the atf, local jurisdictions, and the red cross. We understand the desire and the compelling need to get information on the part of families, stu dents, and loved ones. Unfortunately, this is all of the information that we can verify at this point in time. We are posting information o n our web site as we learned it. I communication systems are taxed . We are posting information on the web site for the state police. I think we are ready to take questions.
- Why not shut down campus after the first shooting rather g -- shooting?
- The information that we have less to make the decision that it was an isolated event to that building and the decision was not made to cancel class' s at that time.
- Can you say why the students were not notified for tw o hours?
- They were notified that there was a shooting. You have to remember that of the 26,000 is that we have, only about 9000 are on campus. When the class start at 9:00 A.M., Thou sands of people are in transit. The question is, where do you keep them when it is most safe? We concluded that the incident at the dormitory was domestic in question. This other events occurred two hours later.
- The first e-mail did not arrive
Uh, how would you know?
How do you know that you haven't been around literally dozens of people just about ready to snap, carrying illegal weapons (or carrying weapons illegally?)
Of course you don't know that. So your statement is nonsense.
The difference is that people in pretty much every nation except for a very limited few are used to being disarmed. In many nations it was actually illegal to own a sword at various points in history. People got used to being disarmed and kept in check then and they're still prepared for it now.
The US is a nation built upon the gun, sometimes positively and sometimes negatively. It was certainly used to greatly horrible affect against the indigenous peoples of both North and South America (not to mention central.) You're simply not going to take that out of culture overnight.
And I might add that events like THIS one do nothing to help the situation.
Of course, it does help to prove the pro-gun point. The police are not there to protect you. Period. Sometimes they protect a single individual or a small group thereof, but only to achieve a tactical goal. Once you have done your duty (testified, acted as bait, what have you) then you go back to a faceless minion. They will no longer provide you one-to-one protection - they can't afford to! There aren't enough cops, and that's just how it's going to be.
The police are part of a system of punishment which is meant to dissuade people from committing crimes. I'm pretty sure it helps, but regardless of the degree to which it has any effect, it simply cannot stop all crime.
The police can't protect you. And you are legally prohibited from protecting yourself.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
So let me answer your question with another question (and I don't mean this to be snarky or rude):
If the general population of Japan is prohibited from carrying firearms, then why do the police have them?
I bet the police carry weapons because those they attempt to prevent from committing crimes, or capture following the commission of a crime, likely, even if not all the time, have guns.
I'll go one step further. In Japan you can only be assured that the LAW ABIDING folks aren't carrying guns. Thereby, you enjoy the illusion of safety.
Now here's my return question for you: why should I, as an American, GIVE UP my right to keep and bear arms, having never used one in a crime, having never committed a felony, and having taken all the necessary steps to purchase and register the guns and obtain a concealed carry permit? By the way, in my state it is perfectly legal to walk down the street with a loaded firearm (of any legal model/style) so long as it is in the plain view of others. A permit and training (as a prerequisite for the permit) is required to carry the weapon out of the view of others.
Although as the years go by it becomes less common, I still see people with pocket-cannons tucked into holsters under their arms or in their belts at the grocery store, convenience store and even some restaurants. I am not afraid of it, nor have I ever been afraid of it. I am a firm subscriber to the theory that people kill people and the weapon involved only depends on how messy the scene is.
And finally, here is a reason why MANY rural areas allow open carry. It has little to do with shooting badguys at high noon and riding off into the sunset. If you work around animals, especially if you ride horses, it is a great idea to carry a handgun. If the horse throws you, and you become entangled in the stirrup and get dragged, you have two options: 1) shoot the horse or 2) die. Have you ever seen a rabid coyote? That's a good reason for a gun too. Also, sometimes when an animal is giving birth, there are complications from the pregnancy requiring the animal to be destroyed. We're not all veterinarians, so when the calf goes breech and the doc ain't around (put that way for effect), the mom usually gets one in the back of the head.
For the record, there is also a great difference in law between OWNING firearms and CARRYING firearms (for reasons other than transport).
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Well, if someone 'sane' in the bldg had been packing a weapon, they might have ended this asshole's rampage a bit earlier....
Or found their weapon stolen and had been used to kill even more people. Or been outgunned in a hall shootout in the same manner as the armed guard at Columbine.
This is breaking news, can we please all put down our politics until the story becomes more coherent?
Because all other countries in the world without the right to have guns have terrible gun crime.
-- Lattyware (www.lattyware.co.uk)
This reminds me of a shooting at a rock and roll venue in my hometown a few years ago and reading on one of the forums about a guy who allegedly was there and remarked that if you could conceal and carry (this is Ohio) in a liquor establishment, then the shooter would of been lucky to kill only one person because this person (the poster on the forum), could of drawn his weapon and taken out the madman.
Having armed guards or police at every entrance to a college campus is pointless, but if some of the professors or other faculty (perhaps even some of the students within reasonable parameters) were at least allowed to have weapons on campus, then crazy gun toting madmen will be put down before they can do too much harm.
Of course the gun control fanatics will say we need to ban all guns, but then what do you do against someone who walks into an undefended campus and starts throwing homemade pipe bombs everywhere?
The reason the United States doesn't live in fear 24/7, like in some places of the world is that we have good guys with guns protecting us from the bad guys with guns who want to harm us for any number of reasons (not to start any flame wars on U.S. foreign policy, but by good, I mean the people who protect this country from invasion).
Nobody yet knows what the motive of the shooter happened to be, but realistically, terrorist cells could kill a whole lot of people by just going to a highly populated area with strict gun control laws and only a handful of armed law enforcement officers and kill a hell of a lot of people before the authorities could respond.
I mean, who needs bombs to kill people when the only people fighting you don't even have knives to protect themselves.
All they had to do was be a threat, making him keep his head down. A handgun does not have the accuracy to hit a person at that distance unless you're really lucky, or a trained marksman with extensive modifications, but it certainly has the range if all you need is for the bullets to travel the distance.
I'm going to quote the wiki, despite the obvious reservations:So it seems that, although the civilians' actions may not have been the sole reason, gunfire from the ground did cause him to take a more defensive posture, with it's intendant limitations on potential targets.
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article15 52956.ece
But I don't expect facts to change your mind.
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
And to think, they had recently ensured no CCW holders could carry their weapons on campus: "Virginia Tech spokesman Larry Hincker was happy to hear the bill was defeated. "I'm sure the university community is appreciative of the General Assembly's actions because this will help parents, students, faculty and visitors feel safe on our campus."
One of the complaints I heard is the first notification was a email two hours later. Students are fairly notorious for being "off the broadcast grid" rarely watching TV or radio. Is email sufficent? If you get 5%-10% immediate penetration, can you count on word-of-mouth for the rest? Many students will stil asleep at 8AM when the shootings started. what about soemthing more intrusive like txting to every known cell. I fear some of the intrusive channels would co-opted for some non-emergency message, then instantly lose their credibility.
It certainly would have ended it much more quickly.
Jack Thompson has already blamed this on video games. What a fucking vulture.
Python coder | PyQt Applications | Writer
You can't conceal a shotgun or Rifle which I'm sure is what he was using.
False, the shooter was using 2 hand guns.
Banning a concealed weapon wouldn't have changed the outcome of this in any way.
False, ANY law abiding citizen with a CCL shoots this motherfucker before he kills 31.
Go look at the crime rates for any state with a Concealed Carry Law - the crime rate plummets for all violent crimes except rape - which just means that more women need to carry guns.
Cars also kill "infinitely" more Americans every year than terrorists and WMDs, yet your country is still in Iraq for some reason.
The car comparison is flawed at best.
The *only* reason making guns illegal would not work is because there's already so many in circulation.
Forcing everyone to carry a big 5 lb lump of steel throughout their lives to "ensure their safety" from what's probably a 1 in 20,000 lifetime event is utterly idiotic - especially considering that in places like Canada and Europe the likelyhood of being shot dead is already LESS THAN your rate of gun-crime.
It's so interesting to see everyone all year long decrying the "1984" orwell state appearing in the UK, but as soon as something like this happens you have dozens of people in the forums calling for everyone in the country to be armed and for a hundred HD cameras to be placed throughout every single campus and 100 people to watch all these HD cameras - just to catch that one guy every 30 years who kills 30 people.
All this while drinking while driving is a minor first offence and 40% of everyone doesn't fasten their seatbelts.
God damned morons, all of you.
There will be a time and a place to discuss the theoreticals of "would doing X have helped?" scenarios. Every anti-something lobbyist is going to try to find something to hinge this on, from video games to guns (or lack thereof).
Good god, this incident only happened a few hours ago. People (like myself) are still shocked, grieving, mourning for the loss of our fellow classmates, faculty, etc. To hear people, like yourself, using this incident to lobby their particular beliefs, is just sickening.
-- jchenx
The most US-centric report about the idea that the United States is filled with gun-toting violent crazies still fails to exonerate the United States entirely. The key column here is Firearm Homicide. The rest are just there to confuse you, pointing out that violent deaths don't always involve guns. Duh. While it's true that Estonia, Brazil, Mexico and Northern Ireland have higher Firearm Homicide rates than the US; Canada, Germany, Singapore, Japan, England, Australia, Norway, Ireland, Israel and Spain have only 25-50% of the Firearm Homicide rate per 100,000. OK, so there's more violent people out there, but even statistics that are attempting to prove your point have a difficult reality to overcome.
Here's the other side of the coin, which is what most people think of when they think of the United States and their gun problem. The numbers aren't substantially different, but the presentation sure is. Gotta love statistics -- I had to read these two articles for 30 minutes before posting to be sure I didn't put my foot in my mouth.
"Please describe the scientific nature of the 'whammy'" - Agent Scully
I agree.
I think everyone should take a course on safe gun handling and basic shooting.
It takes a lot of fear of the unknown out of the equation.
A lot of anti-gun types may come to realise they are just tools. Nothing scary or magical, just tools.
It would be a hell of a stretch to claim that Chinese, Japanese and Korean Americans need the level of protection that we extend to African Americans. There's a whole lot less racial hatred directed at immigrants from Asia than from Africa or even Mexico.
"Oriental" doesn't remotely compare with "nigger." Try to imagine a government employee being let go for saying "oriental."
I find your comment to be disingenuous grandstanding.
As an alumnus of the university, I agree that it's silly to blame the school, especially at this point. It's really easy to play "Monday morning quarterback" after the fact.
... is just insane.
Blacksburg is a very safe environment. The police really don't deal much with major crimes, aside from your normal array of drunken college students gone bad. Actual deaths are extremely rare. When the shooting occurred earlier in the year, regarding an escaped inmate who stumbled onto campus, that was surreal and shocking. But the leap to this
I can't imagine the police and campus security were really prepared for this, since nothing of this magnitude remotely enters our minds.
-- jchenx
Move to Iraq. Everyone has a gun in Iraq. Safest place in the world.
Software patents delenda est.
Jack Thompson uses this to promote his anti-video game agenda and we are all disgusted (and rightly so). Yet we find it acceptable for people on here to push their Second Ammendment agenda. Not making any judgement on whether they are right or wrong (if someone was carrying a weapon they might have been able to stop this guy vs. if everyone was carrying weapons would gun crimes in the classroom go up thus increasing the total number of gun deaths on campus). Can't we just give our agenda pushing a break for day and just feel bad for these kids and their families? Can't we just worry how the politicians (all of them) are going to over react to this and try to push stupid laws just so they feel like they are doing something? This is another sad day we have to live through. Wake up, pull your head out of your asses, and see if there is someone around you that is showing signs that they are mentally distraught. Who knows, if one person would have helped this guy out we might still be complaining about the Imus thing.
Support a great indie game: http://www.abaddon360.com
Perhaps universities should implement mandatory counseling for high pressure students. At the university I graduated from (top engineering Ivy), the engineers have some of the hardest majors on campus. Although I majored in physics, I was exposed to a lot of this as well. At one point I remember waiting to talk to a professor while he was talking to a student who did nothing but play video games and code. The student had no friends or interests. And this isn't uncommon from what I've seen. I was on the edge of this sort of behavior myself. It's not surprising that these kinds of people, who are completely removed from society, could easily crack. I've seen enough problems like that.
I once joked with one person I know that maybe everyone should be assigned a counselor when they first start at a university such as this. Normally I'd say the professors/teachers should notice this, and while that may work in a high school, I know how little most professors care about their students. I know it wouldn't go over well, but maybe mandatory counseling is something that's necessary. Granted, it won't catch everything, but maybe requiring a 15 minute long meeting with a counselor every few months could stop people from going over the edge and either killing themselves or going on a rampage like this. Especially for the people in stressful majors. Even though counselors at universities often aren't the best, I'm sure its not too hard to figure out someone needs extra help. Who knows, maybe it won't do anything. But on the other hand, maybe doing this will save 30 people, and that's worth it.
You can't just walk in off the street and buy an "automatic assault weapon" in any shop. Fully automatic firearms have been illegal in the US for a long time.
The closest you can get are semiautomatic versions of similar looking rifles, which _are_ used for competition shooting, hunting, and other utility and sporting purposes.
In some of the towns I lived in at least 30% of males on the street were carrying. Luckily almost all of those had been through military training and knew a few things about guns, target assesment, risk mitigation etc. Go into the kmart equivalent and the guy helping folk select a tie had a 357 on his hip. Quite a few people got shot by mistake.
In USA there's the problem that so few people with firearms have real firearm training. I am not that opposed to *very* well trained people carrying weapons, but am suggesting that the idea that it should be a citizen's right is broken.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
And I as a journalist have a hard time wrapping my head around it. Indeed, mass-violence predates videogames and even mass-media.
Recently, the hype surrounding the business favorite pair of double-d's (death and destruction) has gone up monumentally, it would seem.
Most news outlets have restrictions on publishing news about suicides that don't involve anyone else. This is so, because mass dissemination of information on suicides has been clinically linked to an increase in suicides in the community. Likely, if this guy had offed himself in his dorm/apartment/car, it never would have been seen or heard. Now, looking at a story about some nutjob taking 32 people with him, it can't be avoided.
This guy has made a name for himself that will be remembered for a long time. Since he wanted to die anyway (presumably), this was an easy way to do it. It's much harder to become famous by inventing a longer lasting lightbulb, or by taking pictures (trust me) than it is by doing something really 'out there'. In this guy's head, fame and infamy are the same thing.
I wonder how we should be treating mass tragedy in the news? Part of me wants to let it go entirely. Certainly not ostrich syndrome-style, but as a means of not making it glamorous and copy-cat worthy.
I think if all news outlets in general tried harder to present the full perspective on life, not just DD sensationalism, we'd all be in a better place.
But maybe I'm wrong. What do I know?
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Predators go after WEAK PREY. Most criminals who might threaten others with violence tend to prefer targets that offer less risk to them. This is why people rob banks and not police stations, and mug old ladies more than bodybuilders, etc.
Anyone that has seen "Reservoir Dogs" will understand that even an unskilled person with a weapon can be a serious threat to a criminal's welfare. If people know that they have a 1 in 5 chance that the person they're accosting will be armed, and can either wound or kill them, rational criminals will either ratchet up the level of force (kill first, then steal), or will be more careful about their targets. Irrational criminals (such as anyone IMO nuts enough to go on a killing spree) will likely be undeterred by this (though they may take different precautions).
The thing is, an armed populace ensures that people KNOW that others can hold them responsible for actions (in an ultimate sense). As a potential victim, whether you're armed makes little difference in the attacker's actions (since they don't know you are armed), whereas YOUR personal chances are greatly improved by being armed (and competent w/ the weapon).
From an informal game theory perspective, the attacker will face the least risk by assuming all victims will be armed. Victims will face less risk by BEING armed, in that they have a chance to neutralize or deter an attacker (whether solely or by numbers).
You might have the occasional cluster-bomb of death when a room full of panicked people pull guns and no one knows who to shoot
Japan has very strict gun-laws, but does that stop Japanese gangs in the major and smaller cities from using guns? Also an interesting side note is that while gun related deaths in Japan are notably less than the US its suicide rate is double that of the US...
Fact is that crime in general (not just gun crime) is pretty rampant throughout America and I for one would feel a lot less secure if you took away the ability for me to protect my home if someone were to break in or carry a weapon if I had all the pre-requisite training to do so. (I am 100% for mandatory training for people who want to carry a weapon and I also don't believe fully automatic weapons are a necessity for the general populace.) But I do believe handguns, rifles, shotguns and the like are not overboard.
All that being said this is pretty much sidebar back and forth to what is a very unfortunate event that was caused by a very, very sick individual.
News Reporters Make Tasty Polar Bear Treats!
...Asians are people, and Orientals are rugs.
paintball
Look, whatever. The issue at hand isn't terminology. It's the murders.
If the students were armed, as provided for by the 2nd amendment, someone could have dropped that guy early on and saved 30 or more people. Chalk up another bunch of deaths to the pussification of American citizens by the mommy government. There will be no correction, though; instead of people going "well duh, I should be armed in case some crazy bastard shows up in my face somewhere", they'll just take a bunch more of your civil rights away at the schools - restrict your movements, require papers, stick RFID tags to you earlobes, x-ray your colons... and a year or so from now, some crazy will do the same thing again, perhaps slightly more cleverly.
Ah, it's so frustrating to hear news like this. All those people did not have to die. Learn to defend yourselves, and be willing to. Seriously. The government cannot protect you from crazies; you have to do it yourself. The government always arrives after these events - only you can stop them as they happen. Get licensed. Practice. Carry. Be a protector instead of a victim. When the government says you can't carry here or there, fight like wildcats to reject this weakening of your ability to defend yourself and those you care about. The government is not your friend.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
In reality there is no clear and permanent classification of people into "good" and "bad". The "good" person from yesterday might be a "bad" person today because of the circumstances they were put in. The "good cop, doing his job at work, might go home and beat his wife", and so on. Our society, our legal system though wants to make that binary classification because it is less painful for us to admit that we could also do "bad" thing once in a while and we surely like to think of ourselves as "good people".
A lot of the criminals when asked why they commited the crime would answer "I don't know why I did it." Notice I am not advocating that we should not punish the offenders or that individuals should not be responsible for their actions (those damn genes made me do it!), but rather that we shouldn't hastily judge and categorize people with permanent overgeneralized labels such as "he is evil" and "I am good". In case of a habitual offender or were a clear pattern of bad behavior occurs perhaps such labels are valid, however there are moments and circumstances were even the sanest and "best" of us can do pretty bad things.
Guns.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
Sure. It happens quite often. http://www.guncite.com/kleckandgertztable1.html Even the very conservative estimates put the number at over half a million per year. The most thorough survey puts it at around 2 million per year.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
You shouldn't fear people with guns, you should fear not having a gun when crazy people want to kill you.
Actually, I fear crazy people who can just walk into K-Mart and arm themselves.
You can look at this situation and say that the problem is that none of the other students had guns.
But you can just as easily look at this situation and conclude that the problem is that the nutjob DID have a gun.
So your solution is 'Give everyone a gun!'. My solution is 'Don't give crazy people guns.'
Your way the crazy guy only manages to kill 3 or 4 people before someone else shoots him. My way, nobody gets shot.
paintball
Except you're wrong.
:http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/1953425.s tm
Here's a list of school shootings from the past ten years, Europe and the States included
In most states you do need a permit to carry a concealed weapon.
You and I agree that "oriental" is not nearly as offensive (or at all) compared to "nigger", but I never compared the two words in the first place. I pointed out your false logic in that if a word originally meant something non-offensive, claiming this as offensive is "inane". Then I gave you another example following your logic. I don't see how this is "grandstanding", but you can see it however you want.
One last thing, now I'm nit-picking here, but this is what you said:
This is what Merriam-Webster says for oriental:Get real. People don't carry snakebite emergency repair kits, and they're much more likely than a gun to be useful.
Strangely, while I've been at gunpoint, knifepoint, baseball batpoint, and fistpoint many times, I've never been faced with a poisonous snake. I suppose my experience is contrary to yours, but then again, I don't live in a jungle.
Slashdot - where whining about luck is the new way to make the world you want.
I would mod the parent up if I had points. Note that VA Tech does not allow students or faculty to carry guns on school property, even if they have a concealed weapon permit. One armed student could have ended this right at the beginning.
There are many things that make me sick about this story, and others like it (the fact that there are "others like it" is one of the things that make me sick).
Please, DO NOT add to it with talks of "worst" or not worst, of "top three", and of "body counts". This ISN'T a game. There is no high score. There's no achievement or rank involved.
This kind of talk always bothers me. I guess it's natural to try to categorize and make sense of it - but it even bothers me for natural events like earthquakes or floods. The difference is, natural events don't care one way or another.
I guess we'll never know the shooter's motivation. But is it that far-fetched to assume that the immense amount of attention previous shootings got played at least SOME role in his mind? That the temptation of immortal infamy made him choose THIS way to go, rather than another?
And now we put him in a "top 3"?
ClutterMe.com - easiest site creation on the Net. Just click and type.
No, but having a gun on you if you happen to "flare up" strongly increases the chance that you will use it. If you don't have a weapon you can hurt someone by punching and kicking, but the chances are that you will not kill them. When you bring a gun into the situation, the chances that someone is going to get killed greatly increase.
...do people at your school seriously bring guns to class? OSU didn't have a gun policy and was in a state with a conceal/carry law without requiring a permit. Pretty much as lax as possible. Yet, no one I nor any of my friends knew *ever* brought a gun to class, and this is in an urban campus in a relatively shitty part of a relatively big city. So, basically, it doesn't matter what law virginia tech had. Frankly, I'd be frightened of anyone so worried about a random massacre happening to them that they feel they need to carry a gun around in the middle of the morning to every class they go to in a school in some backwoods town that almost never sees a murder and has 1/4 of the countries per-capita level of violent crime.
"Question with boldness even the existence of a god." - Thomas Jefferson
Short on time, so short comment:
;) ) - while gun control can probably not help US gun crime stats in a major way in anything approaching the short-ish run, gun access is incredibly important to events such as the Virginia Tech massacre. Kids snap all over the world over lots of silly (and not-so-silly) things - but those that have access to semi-automatic weapons when they snap are many, many times more dangerous. In the larger scheme of things, however, massacres make up a tiny proportion of murders, although they are much more spectacular (and hence garner more media attention, feeding future massacres, etc.) than the average drug hit.
Michael Moore goes wrong in a number of areas with his "culture of fear" model of US gun crime. Highlights follow:
- First, while many nations (including my own, i.e. Sweden) have plenty of legal guns (hunting is a huge movement here and tens of thousands of reservists have FN-FAL assault rifles at home), those are usually of models not well suited to crime, are registered, and required to be stored in a safe fashion. The same goes for, say, Canada (his chosen comparison).
- General US gun deaths are extremely concentrated to certain demographic groups (Read: black & latino bangers in inner-cities.). For instance, a little more than half of all US killers are black, despite making up a bit more than a tenth of the population. (I.e see the bureau of justice statistics: http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/crimoff.htm) The gross murder rate for US lily-white suburbia is much closer to Europe than stats would let on, despite spillover from the inner city wars.
- In short, the main general problem with regards to guns in the US are not trigger happy rednecks in Arkansas or scared soccer moms killing people by mistake. The "culture of fear" theory just comes up short when confronted by reality.
- Gun accessibility, however, is probably important. The banger wars are hardly helped by the plentiful and easy access to guns. It is unrealistic at this point, however, to see how even a total gun ban could yield short-term results in this department. Bangers would hang on to their illegal guns no matter what laws are passed, and only a long battle of attrition could bring major crime-drop windfalls. In the meantime, the law-abiding population would be stripped of percieved and real protection, and political pressures to ease gun access would mount.
- Making things even more complicated, the main benificiaries of a gun ban would in the end be white city liberals, while the hunting 'n guns culture of the rednecks would pay a big chunk of the price. The political problems are obvious.
- Finally (lots more to be said, but I have to go to bed...
That it for today. Goodnight!
The solution to school shootings is *more* guns in the classrooms?
That kind of escalation strategy is what kept the cold war going for so many decades, have you learned nothing?
Holy crap! I was thinking of sending my son to the states to uni, but if that's the kind of response you come up with for this tragedy then I'll be rethinking that.
First and most importantly, how do you stop him from illegally obtaining a gun? As another poster pointed out, we still have large amounts of drugs in the country, which is just as illegal as you want to make this guy having a gun. (Did he even legally obtain the ones he used in this case anyways?)
Secondly, how do you determine who a "crazy person" is, and how to you stop that definition from becoming politically "malleable"? Are you crazy because you are justifiably upset at your child getting killed by a drunk driver, even if you don't (currently) intend to kill anyone? Are you crazy because you hate George Bush, even if you don't (currently) intend to kill him? Are you crazy because you exercise your right to free speech regarding guns, as you just did in your post?
Omnes stulti sunt.
Look, whatever. The issue at hand isn't guns. It's Hypnogenic Ninjitsu.
If the students had been trained as ninjas with the power to hypnotize their attackers, as provided for by Bob's Ninjitsu and Hypnosis College, someone could have done the Stare-of-Freezing to that guy early on and saved 30 or more people. Chalk up another bunch of deaths to the anti-Ninja agenda of American citizens by the mommy government. There will be no correction, though; instead of people going "well duh, I should take Hypnogenic Ninjitsu classes in case some crazy bastard shows up in my face somewhere", they'll just take a bunch more of your martial arts education away at the schools - restrict your hypnosis lessons, require Ninja-study permission slips, make you wear "guns don't kill people, Ninjas do" T-shirts, ... and a year or so from now, some crazy will do the same thing again, perhaps slightly more cleverly and with more throwing stars.
> If the students were armed, as provided for by the 2nd amendment, someone could have dropped
> that guy early on and saved 30 or more people.
Normally I'd agree with that, I'm a paid up NRA member and all that. Not sure how much it would have helped in this incident though because this guy was good. Most shooters only bag a handful because they are losers, its WHY they end up as nutjobs running around with a gun shooting random people. One good guy with a concealed weapon could probably deal with a random idiot. Still wouldn't mind a law striking gun free zones out of any/all government controlled/funded places. All they do is paint big targets on the innocent.
But we are now about ten hours in and haven't heard a peep about the perp except one comment on fox news that he was 'Asian.' Now look at how effective this guy was compared to the usual. Starting to smell like a Religion of Peace job by someone with some jihad training instead of Sudden Jihad Syndrome or a random nutter stressing about finals or a failed relationship.
Other signs it isn't a random nut:
We aren't getting the profile of the perp wall to wall. No experts discussing why he went off.
Ms. Brady hasn't been given wall to wall coverage to spout her usual attempts to turn tragedy into political hay.
Democrat delenda est
Defenseless Victim Zones
- psycho students around me? Yeah sign me up for classes... in some other country. Fortunately I'm already there.
Nice. So when all of my fellow students are packing guns, who defends me exactly? All the stressed-out/teen-angst-ridden/misfit/jock/random
I don't shoot anyone for holding a gun. I only shoot if I see someone shooting unarmed students.
If someone runs into your car in a parking lot, who do you blame? Everyone with a car? Of course not. Only the person you know hit your car. Stop trying to caricature armed citizens as twitching bundles of indiscriminate reflexes. We can think as well as you can, and about the same things.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
I would bet money that this person was not liscensed to carry a concealed weapon.
I think it would be better to say that no person should *want* to be able to walk in off the street and buy an AK47.
Assault rifles are not self-defense or hunting weapons. They are assault weapons. They have a very specific purpose: killing and wounding large numbers of people at a very fast rate.
This doesn't mean they should be banned. Why should I, a police officer, be allowed to have weapons like that while you can't? America is supposed to be a government by, of and for the people: if the people's words aren't enough to effect change, they have to be able to back it up. Trust me, you do not want people like me dictating your lives.
What happens if the government stops taking no for an answer?
We need to eliminate the causes of violent behavior, not the tools for doing it. If the citizens are only allowed to have small arms, then the army and the police should be banned from using them too.
If the gunman had pulled his psycho bullshit in a crowded Virginia mall, the shooter's life may have ended a lot quicker, but that does not mean that fewer people would be dead. If someone started shooting back, there would have been more bullets flying around, and with more bullets flying around, there's a lot higher chance that people will get hit, especially if this is taking place in a mall with a lot of people.
This isn't a video game. In real life, bullets do not mean instant death. Random bullets may hit some people but I'll bet the chances of living from a stray round in that environment are a lot better than being lined up against a wall and shot point blank in the head.
Furthermore, for those that go get hit in an exchange like that, they have a lot higher chance of survival because paramedics can reach them sooner, if people in the middle of the situation know the shooter is down they can flag in the police in and tell them it is safe so the paramedics can come in right away without having to take the time to do a full sweep first.
Not to mention that it's a ridiculous assertion that "bullets would be flying everywhere", at most a handful of people at any time would have a weapon on them and also be trained in the proper use thereof. You forget that people who carry firearms legally are generally not batshit insane and therefore less likley to just spray lead everywhere.
I actually have a relative attending the school as a grad student. She is OK as it turns out but it makes me mad to think the school was just an open playground for a shooter like this with only law enforcement able to stop him.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
If the students were armed...
But what if the assailant WASN'T armed?
Maybe you shouldn't say anything until you know where he got his gun. If he bought it at K-Mart at 7AM and was shooting people at 7:30 AM, that might be a pretty strong indication that the problem here wasn't the availability of guns to the other students, the problem was the availability of guns to the assailant.
Also, it's premature to blame the law for the lack of guns in the possession of the students. Not only would the law have to be different, we would also need to know if there were any students present who would have been carrying a firearm themselves if it was legal to do so.
But, the reality of the situation is we're screwed either way:
Not all gun crime is the same. Some gun crime is impulsive - people who are impulsively violent are more destructive when they have ready access to a firearm. In these kinds of gun crimes, eliminating ready access to firearms would reduce the effects of gun crime. And some gun crime is premeditated - the criminal is going to get the gun they need to commit the crime. In that kind of crime, reducing ready access to firearms creates an opportunity for the criminal.
So you can't solve the gun problem, you can just favor one kind of gun violence over another.
paintball
NO GUNS - NO DEATHS its as simple as that, how many people can you kill with just sticks and stones?, in the same amount of time you can take out 30 people with a semi automatic? US society is based on fear and buying a gun only adds to it, until someone flips and kills 30 innocent.
...what matters is what you like, not what you are like...
It's really sad, all those people died for no reason. I think they could have been prevented however. We were all sent emails at 9:30 about an incident that happened at 7:15 AM... that seems a bit odd to me. Also as a precaution, the campus should have been locked down when the first shooting at WAJ occurred, but they ASSUMED he had left. If classes were cancelled, Norris wouldn't have been full of students for the gunman to kill. Virginia Tech is such a great school, both socially and academically. Its a shame that this will scar our reputation forever. High schoolers have been touring the school for the last couple weeks; its too bad that a lot of smart kids, I'm sure, have been turned off by this incident and will choose another university. Thanks you all for your support
Imagine everyone opening fire in self-defence and no one knowing who the gunman actually was (sounds like the US Army in Iraq today!). Where you've got a lot of people carrying guns, it's been known to happen.
Why not link us to a story where thirty people died because of this.
Someone shooting is, (a) shooting at someone they saw shoot someone else and now coming towards them menacingly with a gun, and (b) aiming for non-vital areas as the intent is more to stop than to kill. That is the difference, the killer is in fact aiming to kill while those with legal handguns will generally be aiming to wound and therefore mistakes may not be fatal. I'd rather have someone shoot me in the side or leg because they thought I was the shooter, than to have the shooter make sure I was dead because that was pretty much his whole plan.
A crowd of people with guns being attacked by one man is a self limiting problem and means far fewer fatalities than a crowd full of unarmed people lined up against a wall by one man.
People against guns act like every single person with a gun is exactly the same, crazy killer or well-trained mother of four.
I don't even own a gun myself, I just grew up around a lot of gun culture and know what responsible gun use is like.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The question, I think, is if you are more frightened of someone that goes through the process to carry a concealed weapon (and infact does so) than you are of some fuckin' nut who goes around shooting people? I for one can gladly say that I'd rather have the former.
Also, to date, no legislation has been very effective at keeping firearms out of the hands of criminals (you might note that historically no prohibition has been effective). Most legislation is more of a burden to an honest person owning a gun than to a criminal (who often will just steal a gun). And at most, such legislation only cuts down on the number of accidents involving firearms. Note, drowning kills more people and no where in the Constitution does it mention a "right to swim."
Don't worry about the mule, just load the wagon.
The Second Amendment was drafted in 1789 and much has changed in the world since then. To hold a section of the Bill of Rights above your head and declare that it should bestow a particular right upon a group of humans forever just because they happen to have been born in the middle third of North America is utterly illogical. There were no automatic or semi-automatic weapons in the 18th Century, and it was conceivable that a group of a few thousand armed and motivated farmers could sack the White House should the need arise. Those days are long gone, unless you're willing to ensure that private citizens also have the right to drive battle tanks and possess tactical nuclear weapons.
Almost every building on campus has underground passages. However, the 2nd floor of Norris Hall has double wide, wooden doors with handles that can be held with chains. I've never run across to the attached building to see how they are connected, but the ones I've used are easily 'locked' with chains. The door of Norris is also VERY big and heavy, made of solid wood about 10ft high, it actually requires a bit of strength just to open, so if that was chained from the inside, it would be almost impossible for a single person to open that door.
It's like the mis-use of the term African-American. African-American is a cultural distinction. Not all blacks are African-American some are from the Caribean, some are Pacific Islanders, some are African. The term 'black' is offensive very few people... and very useful in describing race and society.
But what do you do about Asian/Oriental? You could try to be specific on country of origin... but Chinese isn't very good as there are many different races/ethnicities from China. If you're going to distinguish between Han Chinese and Korean, you might as well distinguish Tibetan too.
My vote is to simplify skin color just like eye/hair color: Whites, Blacks, Browns, Yellows, and Reds.
oh... and for those of you on this thread who think 'oriental' is as bad as the n-word... you have not seen/experienced real full-force dehumanising racism if you can honestly claim that. There are racist terms equavalent to the n-word, but 'oriental' isn't one of them.
There are 10 types of people in this world, those who can count in binary and those who can't.
Until the next time
Absolutely correct and shown by numerous real world (Abu Ghraib) and even a couple of experimental situations like the Stanford Prison Experiment. Some of the 'animals' who perpetrated crimes against the other prisoners in the SPE were exactly the same kind of college kids who died today.
It is precisely what was described by Hannah Arendt in Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil
Its people who think they could never ever do that who are the most dangerous.
If New York City and Kennesaw, Georgia had the same population, New York would have hundreds of times the number of shooting homicides
Guns are tightly controlled in New York. In Kennesaw, every household is legally obligated to keep a gun. So explain to me again how gun control saves peoples' lives?
Or maybe, just maybe, you can't compare two very different places and assume that gun control is the difference!
I'm not arguing for or against gun control, but as someone once said, "your argument is trash".
Stupidity is like nuclear power, it can be used for good or evil. And you don't want to get any on you.
Hmmn, so Germany and France aren't in Europe?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Steinhäuser
(Note that he was stopped by a teacher brave enough to not be a victim)
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Durn
And that was with 30 seconds of Google-ing. I'm sure 5 minutes worth would dig up pages of results.
Take care getting off that high horse of yours.
"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former."
I never said I'm for banning guns. In fact, I'm in support of conceal/carry laws (though I think a permit should be required). People think *I'm* a nut for thinking that arming yourself around OSU is a good idea. I just find the idea that people would be bringing guns to class at 9am in blacksburg virginia to be strange, regardless of what laws they have, especially considering my experiences at a much much more dangerous college (we'd have a student or two killed almost every year, and countless assaults/rapes).
"Question with boldness even the existence of a god." - Thomas Jefferson
*snicker* Heh, yeah, guns for everyone would have solved *this* particular problem. And yet, it would have created a million other problems. Such as, every minor quarrel could turn into a block wide shoot-out. Look, your approach has been tried. It was tried right here, in this country, and not even that long ago. It was called the Wild West. Where "law and order" was enforced by which group had the biggest/most guns. Where heroes were made out of people for such things as bringing federal order to remote towns.
People like you have no idea what it means to live in a society where everyone has a gun. All you have is your little pornographic power fantasies. Yeah, completely banning guns is no recipe for global peace. But neither is giving everyone a gun.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
Doubtful that this guy bought the guns for the massacre. His effectiveness with them indicates he probably had them for quite a while, and practiced shooting fairly frequently.
Seriously though, people bring up this bizarre "man gets angry, buys a gun, shoots people, all in the same day" scenario quite frequently, but I have yet to hear of a single incident where anyone has actually done that. Most shootings are committed by people who already have guns, and have usually had them for quite a while. Face it, the time it takes to go buy a gun is usually long enough to cool off any normal "hothead". If the law considers a couple hours ample time to "cool off" when making the distinction between 1st and 2nd degree murder, then why do some people think it should take 3-14 DAYS (varies from state to state) to "cool off" when trying to buy a firearm? It's absurd.
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
The illusion that the availability of firearms or the lack thereof will have anything to do with the desire of one person to kill another. The desire to murder is a far greater problem in an individual or a society than the capability to follow through on that desire, and so long as we insist on ignoring this sociocultural problem and instead focus on reactive, stopgap measures that seek to prevent access to lethal tools, those desires will always be able to find a new outlet.
As an analogy, which is worse: someone using drugs, or someone's life being so miserable that they turn to drugs?
I was reading some info about crime stats and one interestign thing: Victims of crimes who possessed guns/weapons during the incident had a good chance ... of having their own weapon used against them.
Check your stats - and your sources.
Victims of crimes almost never have their own guns used against them.
The primary people who DO have their own guns used against them are police who carry their guns in a belt holster. Typically this happens when they're focussed on one crook and have to close with him (or on some other distraction) and a different crook grabs their gun from behind. (There is training on avoiding this, but most departments don't pay for it.) This is why uniformed officers (who open-carry) must disarm in courtrooms (to avoid hostage situations when a crook tries to get away) but plainclothesmen (who carry concealed) are encouraged to carry (so they can assist the bailiff if such a situation develops.
Such training is available to civilians, too. (In fact, I have taken it.) It's called "gun retention". It includes training in attempting to disarm your opponent - mainly to show how hard it is to actually do so, partly to teach you to identify the very few situations where it's even remotely possible AND improves your chances over hanging around and hoping you don't get killed, and what to do then. (Main one is when the bad guy has the gun poked into your spine from behind.)
According to FBI statistics, resisting an attempted crime with a gun is the ONLY way to reduce your probability of death or injury below quiet cooperation - and it cuts it by a bunch. Anything else (including trying to reason with the crook) raises the probability of injury to the victim. (Knives are particularly bad.)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
I'd like to send my thoughts to the shooter, as well as the victims.
College is a time of unthinkable often unheard sacrifice for many people. People give up everything to go, working terrible jobs for years to save enough to get started, leave everyone and everything they know to live in an isolated world, and find their isolation enforced by bitter poverty and relentless work. For a lot of people, this is their only chance at a future; If they fail, they'll be trapped with a minimum wage job and tens of thousands of dollars of debt they have no way to pay back and nothing tangible to show for it. For a lot of people, this time is an amplifier, sending all their insecurities, all their fears, all their self-hatreds into overdrive, changing it from something indistinguishable from the background noise of life to a roar, deafening and all-encompassing.
If this is the truth for the shooter, I'm sorry you couldn't be saved. You have ended your future and stolen others. I'll shed a tear fall for you and your fallen life, and your senseless, useless, meaningless death.
For anyone reading this, facing the same path, please know that there is a light at the end of the tunnel, and that there are people who know what you're going through. It's the hardest thing you'll ever have to do, but persevere, and don't become like this wasted life, because those who fight for the future they want are the ones who carry the heaviest burden, and the ones who shine the brightest.
It's been a long time.
Given the extremely rare circumstances when one would be shot at by a random stranger on a college campus?
For someone who was out to shoot people, armed students would've been obvious targets, not a guaranteed end to the situation.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
What happens if you see someone with a gun shoot someone else with a gun, then turn and point their gun at another guy with a gun? Is that person the original shooter, or did they just kill the original shooter? Should you shoot that person to protect everyone else in case they are the original shooter? What happens if you're the person they point their gun at next, do you shoot them because they just shot someone else and now they're about to shoot you? Or do you lay down your gun because they're just confused because you still have your gun out after they shot the original shooter?
Oh yes, and did I mention, you have approximately 1/2 a second to evaluate and answer the above questions.
Speak before you think
Train to act when needed, to have the peace of mind to destroy your aggressor and the medicine to help others around you. wu, ch'an, yi. War, Meditation, Medicine. Five and half years after 9/11 and Americans still line up to die? Our ancestors must be ashamed, we have become sheep.
.357 under your arm, go for it. Carry a knife or Leatherman. Take CPR and trauma classes. Practice Kung Fu. Call your Representative. Everyone should know how to "safe" a hot gun. Do whatever it takes. Be Ready. It's your duty as Americans.
These students today, I don't want to be harsh on the injured, but they should have been READY. Everybody should be ready for anything. If this means carrying a
Fight back!
Josh
gigantino.tv - Heavy but weighs nothing.
In turkey, only licensed people can BUY guns for having them in their homes, and to acquire a license for this is hard.
Acquiring a license for CARRYING a gun, is HELL.
as a result, gun ownership is at very low levels compared to usa.
but, as in all countries, criminals have no problems about acquiring any type of small arms. they cant acquire semi automatics, automatics only, as there is terrorism threat in turkey and state pays much attention to this. but, small arms and rifles can be acquired quite easily.
and EVEN if you have a gun to defend yourself, as once a police officer had put it, when he was investigating a burglary at my house "If you have a gun, and see a burglar, shoot it towards the ceiling, shoot it towards the ground, shoot it away from him. if he EVER gets harmed, injured, or heck, even dead, you will serve at least 2 years, while he will get out in 2 months. Its no use having a gun, only maybe if you can scare him by showing it to him, and then they are not scared these days".
so, in turkey, even if you can acquire a gun, you better shove it up in your arse than use it in your own defense.
and, as the exact opposite is being valid for criminals, criminals are getting much more bolder in turkey, there are even burglary cases when burglars sense that the owners of the house are actually awake in their beds, but just imitating to be asleep not to be harmed, they say "paps, ma, we know you are awake. but just lie there as you were asleep, so noone will get harmed". and they get away with this.
final word : never ever ban guns, or bar it from being used in self defense. criminals WILL be acquiring guns as they always did, the difference is that when you ban guns, you wont.
Read radical news here
Well, I'll tell you what. Why don't you go tell these kid's parents and friends that it was ok, because it was rare. Go ahead. I'll wait here for you. With a first aid kit. Hopefully, that'll be sufficient.
Agreed. No guarantees. However, at least they would have had a chance, one that improved in direct proportion to the number of armed and trained people in the group. As it was, however, they had none, because the rules required them to be defenseless. Now they're dead, and we're not talking about "chance", are we? No. because we're certain they're dead, and we're certain they had no way to defend themselves.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
I find it amazing that even in the face of such horrible events, human nature is such that it can find humor.
Because this is the thing: Life isn't terrible. Yes, very bad things happen. People do horrible things. Always have, always will. This one is worse than many. But we cope, and continue, and manage to find beauty and companionship and humor despite it all, and that's amazing.
So, thank you for your humor. I think that it is a necessity in tragedy, a good grounding to prevent us from getting wrapped up in our mourning, or at least to prevent us from being swept away in wave after wave of media-induced panic - they tend to not report the good things, you have to use your own eyes for that.
I know this post is old, so there's little chance of people reading this, but somebody needs to recap the gun argument. It's gotten short-changed. First, for those who say "It's too early to use this tragedy for political purposes" I call bullshit. For any other political purpose -- violence in games, the Iraq war, boxers or briefs -- yes, you are correct. But all of us (and I speak as someone who lives close to VT) can put ourselves in those student's shoes. We can imagine being hunted down and killed while we wept, shaking against a wall. This emotional feeling, this empathy, is _exactly_ what is required to understand the gun argument. If we wait 'till later it will be too late. I don't own a gun. To me, they're a good way to hurt people accidentally. But I undertsand that the purpose of gun ownership is to empower the citizen. It's not crime control, it's not to prevent the evil overlord from conquering the world. Guns are about freedom and personal power, and they represent everything that is right with the United States. In this country we proudly give people the power to hurt themselves and others. We drive cars, we fly our own airplanes, we skydive, we smoke, we own guns, and we eat cheeseburgers. We give these freedoms freely, understanding that, yes, people are stupid and citizens will misuse them and some harm will occur. We do NOT weigh the deaths that would occur one way or another in some sort of better-than-you morality equation to take our freedoms away. The greater good is served by the productive chaos of people having greater personal powers. That's the theory of our government. Yes. If we had a prison society there would be less crime. But if we had a prison society our society would be about as useless as some of those old European countries that we left to begin with. We left them because -- they took away too many freedoms. How quickly people forget. The reason that today is exactly the right time to have this discussion is that just like you, I would want a gun if I were one of those kids. I might hurt somebody innocent. I might run like a frightened child (most likely). All sorts of bad things _might_ happen. But I know that if I were going to die, I would want the personal power to stop that from happening. Looking at our constitution and our wars for freedom, we should be absolutely ashamed that we would sit idly by with our thumbs stuck in our mouths while we take that power from folks and then say something to the effect of, "well, people are stupid, so we know we can't give them dangerous things. They'll just hurt each other." Such paternalistic balderdash! It's a load of tripe that can't pass the real test -- how the commenter would _really_ feel if they were in those kidss' shoes. That's why the gun argument, of all arguments, is the one that is most appropriate for today.
"The simple fact is that our well trained army of about 1 million men could easily and without breaking a sweat, subdue all 299 million of the rest of the United States population, even if each one had a bolt-action rifle, given technology, resources, tactics and general training, if it came to that."
You're a soldier. You're ordered to turn your weapons on your friends, cousins, uncles, aunts, brothers, sisters, fathers, and mothers. Chances are that a good 90% of the military would refuse those orders, and a good percentage of that 90% would use their training to help the 299.9 million stand up against the 100,000.
Not a Twitter sockpuppet... but I wish I was.
I work under the assumption that people who are properly trained, as I advocated, will act correctly due to that training. Generally, that's a good assumption. That's why everyone in the army and the police force doesn't go shooting each other left and right. Just the way my martial arts students don't go firing off kicks and punches at other people in public. So yes, I can extend that level of trust without thinking about it. No problem. Could I be wrong? Yes. But the odds favor my being correct. The existing armed and trained groups make my point very well.
As I said, you shoot the fellow you know started the show, or who is shooting at you. If you don't know who that is, you don't shoot. End of evaluation. That's what training is for. I do not advocate arming people without training them. So stop trying to validate situations that involve untrained, armed people. If you can't understand what competent weapons use is, you're not competent to argue weapons use at all.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
I'm not saying it was OK because it was incredibly goddamn rare. What I'm saying is that to allow students to arm themselves for the 1 in 1 million chance of a school shooting, or attack on campus is insane.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
I was waiting for this kind of non-thinking attitude to surface, and I didn't have to wait long.
Sigh....
The firearms industry, throughout the world, is already one of the most highly regulated industries. The right to keep and bear arms is a fundamental right, not a privilege, and it comes with grave responsibilities. It is a right born unto every American citizen, save for those that have forsaken their right due to felony conviction, domestic abuse, drug use, or mental incapacity. Gun control laws have repeatedly shown themselves to be ineffective, and even worse, they allow oppression to go unchecked. If you think that the current political climate is oppressive, what with the Patriot act allowing for warrantless searches, the suspension of Habeas Corpus, "National Security Letters", etc., just wait until you've given up your right to fight back. Time and time again, states have passed concealed carry laws, and the lies from the anti-gun crowd have been shown to be just that... lies. At worst, there is no increase or decrease in crime (by people who don't care about gun laws), and at best, people have been freed to protect themselves when necessary, without having to fear prosecution.
Just this weekend, the NRA annual meetings occurred in St. Louis. Do you know how many people were shot?
That's right... zero. Anyone want to guess why? Because potentially everyone there was armed. Perhaps no one was armed, but at least criminals were kept guessing.
I'm quite sure that my retort to your ill-thought-out post will be met with visceral reactions from people who believe that the government knows best and is most capable of protecting me, but I'm not buying any of it. I have respectfully refrained from cursing at you and calling you names, because I believe that to be unproductive. My best allies in this argument are truth and history. History shows, that the best way to control a populace is first to disarm it. The only way the anti-gunners will be successful in disarming this populace will be to lie and spread FUD.
If you wish to waive your freedom in the interest of a little perceived security, you deserve neither. I, on the other hand, will protect my freedom and security by practicing ALL of my rights under the constitution, and would fight to the death to protect yours as well.
Other than this text, there is no discernible information contained in this sig.
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
So, rather than taking the guns out of the hands of potential shooters you would increase the potential exponentially by placing a gun in the hand of every student on campus??!
Young persons + Drugs and Alcohol + University/School environment + Firearms for all = Not such a terribly bright idea
Remember, you've got to shoot first if you're to save yourself, this means shooting the moment you suspect that someone might be planning to pull a gun on you, holding them at gunpoint is fairly useless with this class of shooter as they're generally self-destructive as it is, they aren't about to stop.
And of course making guns the norm may well increase the likelihood that groups/gangs may form in order to carry out deranged fantasies.
I've tended to kick myself each time i find myself stereotyping the US as a nation of guncrazed maniacs but with attitudes like yours being modded up so heavily maybe it's true, I always thought it was protection of the right to bear arms, not a requirement to do so...
However the USA has fallen behind with the rest of the world with it's attitude to gun ownership. It's definitely behind with it's "fear" of tougher gun regulation.
Numerous other countries have introduced tougher gun laws(England, Australia, Canada, etc) and introduced programs that allow certain types of weaponry but not extreme items such as semi automatics, which aren't required to hunt deer for example.
The trend that has been observed in these countries is this:
Increasing gun related crimes leads criminals to seek more aggressive weapons to stay ahead of the curve.
The gun restrictions are introduced with programs to cash in guns for money or desirable items (such as the Guns for Guitars program.)
Criminals begin to brandish lesser weapons such as knives, because they are cheaper, easier to obtain, and the criminal realises that their target won't be packing a semi-automatic.
The strongest upside to this is that you can't massacre a crowd with a knife in the same way that you can a semi-automatic weapon.
What is observed here is instead of one-upmanship: where individuals are trying to get more sophisticated weapons so they stay on top of the arsenal game. There is an erosion of the basic level of arsenal held by the community, defense is still possible with simpler items, but the ability to do massive damage such as rampage shootings is reduced. The easy access to wilful weaponry is removed, making it difficult for a regular person to carry out large scale massacres. Yes, a massacre can still be co-ordinated, but it requires a great deal more work, often with elaborate criminal connections to obtain the weapons, this gives policing organisations time to prevent the act from happening(and a psychologically enraged person is not likely to complete these steps before calming down). This contrasts to a situation where excessive weaponry is freely commerced, where an enraged person has easy access to a high-end weapon, which allows them to quickly carry out a massacre.
The United States has a great foundation myth of the ragtag band of civilians in the woods with substandard civilian weapons banding together and winning themselves a country (the now hated French have no role in the myth despite having a very major role). This story in my opinion is being used as an excuse for people to hide military sidearms in their jackets and just so they can feel strong. Your guns have not protected you from a ruler that has more authority than George III ever had, and your guns will not get rid of him, laws setting term limits will do that.
I really do not understand the obessession with the second amendment and with civilians carrying military weapons around even though I learned how to shoot a rifle at the age of seven.
I feel very sad after reading about this - and my thoughts are with the families and friends of those killed and injured.
How depressing.
What a waste.
What I want to add is that - from what I have personally seen - laws restricing firearms are not very helpful. I currently live in the Republic of Colombia, where not only are there very tight restrictions on civilian firearm ownership, there are very harsh penalties in place for violating those laws. Firearms are also ridiculously expensive, whether being legally sold by the Government or illegally by civilians.
Darn near everywhere you go down here (the movies, clubs, and on the road) you get patted down for guns, by private security, cops, or soldiers.
From what I have read about the topic, Colombia has had the dubious honor of having the highest murder rate in the world during many, many years.
Two of my cousins have been murdered, one was shot.
An acquaintance of mine was murdered - shot.
Granny's cleaning lady, her son, was murdered - shot.
I have personally seen the aftermath scenes of several shootings.
Have laws helped? Apparently not.
I agree with previous posters in that PEOPLE NEED TO BE NICE TO ONE ANOTHER - or at least civil.
People down here, for instance, are not nice - and the results are all over the local news, every single day.
What I aim to express with this post is that, from personal observation, laws do not make much difference - education and civil behavior make a difference.
MRH
SARAVA!
..and by the same token, when a Japanese student gets stressed and goes postal, he can't simply go get his gun and shoot a bunch of innocent people.
God was my co-pilot, but then we crashed and I was forced to eat him.
As an Australian where gun control is in effect a gun -being fired- makes the state, possibly national news. THAT is what happens when you have gun control its not exactly mysterious guys.
"And to this day, US citizens generally understand that if the government ever becomes tyrannical and repressive, "we the people" have the right (and must have the means) to overthrow it."
I seriously doubt that mate. A random armed rabble will not overthrow your government by force. You have invented the most powerful Military on the planet. Each time I see something like this happen over there it just reinforces the fact that we have made the correct decision. I don't in the slightest fear my government to the point that I'm willing to support the decay of my community in order to support what someone a few hundred years ago called 'inalienable rights'. It probably sounded like a good idea at the time given recent events that had occurred, but today it's a burden that costs you. You and your families safety.
The argument that 'bad guys have gun' is fairly ineffective too, because from what I observe over here, if they have them, they don't use them as anything but a threat. In fact, right here in Sydney I have ONLY ever seen guns holstered on the belts of police and security guards. In fact, the though that someone might be carrying a gun doesn't even occur to me any more.
Its unfortunate, but I suspect that the only way Americans will ever view the preservation of their society as more important that the ineffectual feeling of safety that arises from owning a weapon is when they start becoming too afraid to travel their own streets. Even then I doubt it. Before you shoot me down in flames, ask yourself why this always happens in the US. Why is this even news over there? From memory it seems to have every single year, or at least seems that way. Without gun control you will just have to get used to it.
Personally I loved playing soldiers when I was a kid. I lived on a military base and got to use the ranges all the time. I grew out of it though and am glad that our government listen to the people and not the lobbyists. Now we have a homicide by gun rate of 0.3073 per 100,000 vs. the US with 3.6000 according to <URL:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_violence>.
Apple to Apples you Americans die more than 10 times more often than us from guns. We however lack your 'inalienable rights' to bear arms.
Why do you anti-gun people keep pulling that one out? Do you really believe it? This isn't the movies; the bad guy can't "use the Force" to grab a gun.
The gun wouldn't have any bullets by the time it could be grabbed, and grabbing is only possible if I'm really bad at aiming. It works like this:
Only have the gun if you'd be willing to shoot an enemy. This is only an issue for pacifists.
Only show the gun when violence is likely.
If the attacker could grab the gun or could shoot you, then you shoot immediately. You try to shoot before the attacker even sees the gun. Otherwise, you may give the attacker a chance to follow orders and/or flee. Any movement toward you (to grab the gun or hurt you) means you shoot.
When you shoot, you aim for the easy target that will stop the enemy. Nearly always, this is the center of the upper chest. (heart, lungs, liver, spleen, spine, etc.) You don't mess around with targets that would be hard to hit, such as the head or knee.
When you shoot, you fire many rapid shots. You can empty the gun. You may reserve a couple bullets if you fear that the enemy may have an accomplice who might also need to be shot. If you know there is only one enemy, you empty the gun into him.
Now imagine that you are the bad guy. How exactly would you have grabbed the gun?
Limiting gun access generally affects only those people who weren't criminals in the first place, so you only impact the honest people.
What is your evidence for that statement?
If gun access is limited, how many honest people are affected?
To what degree are they affected? Count both would-be gun owners who are inconvenienced, and people who don't end up the victim of a gun crime.
How many criminals are affected?
To what degree are they affected?
I don't know the answers to those questions, but you don't either. And your statement seems to assume that gun restrictions will ONLY inconvenience honest people and have no effect on criminal's access to guns. That doesn't make much sense. It's a convenient argument, but it's unlikely to be a true one.
How were you planning to do that? Randomly search people and their houses?
The same way we enforce any other law - good police work, probable cause, search warrants. You figure out who sells guns illegally. You figure out who they sold them to. And then you go and arrest all those people. And you've arrested them before they went on to commit a violent crime - because you were able to arrest them on the basis of just getting the TOOLS to commit a violent crime.
Who says access is unfettered? Just and try to get a rifle when you're a convicted felon.
It's relatively unfettered. Getting a rifle when you're a felon is easy. You do it illegally, but since it's so easy to legally acquire a firearm and then 'lose' it, it's easy to get them illegally as well. If you make guns harder to get legally, then they also become harder to get illegally, as the dealer who is selling them illegally is going to start charging more to reflect the increased cost/risk of him being in that business.
paintball
You can run away from a knife. A weaker person with a knife can be overwhelmed. It's also difficult to quickly kill someone with a knife.
who has noticed the pervasive We Obviously Need More Cops Around Our Higher Learning Facilities message being looped on tv?
Please stop stalking me, bro.
My apologies to Mr. Chiang-- he has posted a note saying that he was not the shooter. As he says on the same livejournal:
I am not the shooter. Through this experience, I have received numerous death threats, slanderous accusations, and my phone is out of charge from the barrage of calls. Local police have been notified of the situation.Mod parent up.
As a fairly normal college student, I think that most people in a 9AM lecture aren't wearing proper pants, let alone hauling around a gun.
Actually an armed rabble overthrowing the U.S. government is quite feasible. Look at Iraq as an example of how well an armed rabble can stand up to our military. Throw the potency of guerrilla warfare on top of the fact that at least some of the military would refuse to shoot their own citizens in their homeland, and you have pretty decent odds of winning. Also there are limits as to the degree of force that would be used as no ruler wants to destroy their own infrastructure. I doubt even Bush would nuke Atlanta to maintain power.
There are 11 types of people, those who know unary and those who don't.
One armed student could have ended this right at the beginning.
Well, one armed man just killed 20 people. The solution isn't to have MORE guns, but to have LESS. Instead, have MORE SECURITY at these buildings. Weapon detectors, security officers, i.e. people KNOWN to be safe with guns.
The guy that shot up a college in Montreal last september had all his guns registered.
You can't take the sky from me...
Except you conveniently ignore that virtually every one of these crimes has occurred in areas where legal possession is banned, so there's no one present with the means to defend themselves.
More strawmen, please. This one's easy...
This is ridiculous!
Don't you realise why things like that happen more often in the USA than in Europe?
"What happens if you see someone with a gun shoot someone else with a gun, then turn and point their gun at another guy with a gun?"
Well I'd hope I'd first run for cover, even if I did have a gun strapped to my waist, and once i felt less vulnerable I'd probably pull out my gun and shoot anyone pointing at me.
Think that's the issue here. We're not talking about a random hero in a classroom, we're suggesting if someone that was killed happened to have a gun and was targeted, perhaps they could have defended themselves.
my karma will be here long after I'm gone
I felt quite horrified reading the news this morning. Even here, the incident is frontpage news. The fact that my sister and her husband are both medical school students in the US brings the incident even closer home. Having never visited or lived in the US, I have a question in mind (which perhaps many other asian/other nationals also wonder).. Is the picture of school and college life in the US, painted in Hollywood movies, really a reflection of reality? Now, India itself is probably one of the world's worst countries to grow up in for children. (Yes, it is, ok? I'm not being anti-national when I say that!). In terms of health, nutrition, child labor and other measures of human development, we pretty much scrape the bottom of the barrel over and over every year. Even so, I have never seen or felt the kind of hostility, peer pressure to conform and mental stress that, going by movie/TV standards, children in the US seem to be subjected to. I mean a social tension, although I'm sure economical disparities and dynamics must contribute in many ways... Is it for real? Are families irrelevant, or a source of negative rather than positive emotion for a lot of young people? Do kids really grow up too early, too fast? (atleast, that's the way it looks to me on TV, maybe my outlook is provincial by world standards..). And is it really easy to get your hands on a gun? I'm sure I couldn't even find one today in Delhi (I'm 25 now) even if I tried hard, and I'm pretty sure I'm better off for it. Can you guys from the states give your perspective? And, indeed, how it's different in Europe and other developed nations?
Actually most schools actually ban firearms through their administrative code. I don't know about OSU, but here at WSU (Washington) firearms are not allowed on campus even with a permit. However I can tell you a lot of my friends carry anyway, and I know of 5 off hand that want it changed, and there's actually a student group moving for change now. Its not because we don't trust the other students, or we feel unsafe but we prefer to exercise our rights even if they deem it illegal. If you choose not to carry and you end up in a situation like that, you made the choice for yourself. However if someone else tells you, "NO YOU CANT CARRY" and then the shit hits the fan, its the person who banned the carry in the first place, because the outcome could have been different. Just because you're in a small town doesn't mean "It cant happen to you." Case in point recently there were a couple murders here in Pullman and Moscow.
I truthfully don't know how many would actually regularly carry, however most who go through the effort to get their CWP and the rest of it will carry just because.
People often ask me why I have a CWP and why I carry even in the middle of no where. This is my response:
"I would rather have it and not need it, than need it and not have it."
-PB_TPU_40 The trick to flying is to throw yourself at the ground and miss.
Don't distort arguments with stupid emotional appeals. If more people would die due to low profile incidents on a highly armed campus that people that die in these high profile incidents with unarmed campuses, then arming students is a bad idea, period. I don't think that situation is unreasonable to suspect considering 10's of thousands of gun related deaths a year and less than a fifty or a hundred coming from school shootings. And guess what, those people would have families too.
I am a believer in arming well trained law abiding citizens to deter crime, but the revelation that people that die have families isn't very awe inspiring. Either a policy saves more lives or it doesn't. Don't bullshit around with emotional appeals to crying parents.
Relax I just want some peanuts.
Also, if you go from having one student armed to having all students armed, then the rarity of such events drops as a result.
Here's a better idea: why not go from one student armed to no students armed. It's absurd to solve a gun problem by throwing more guns at it.
Actually, yes they did. Unless you're willing to go for unlimited escalation of force carried by each and every individual person, you have to call it quits at some point and just trust that strength in numbers is going to overcome whatever weapon the assailant is carrying. If you want to be accusing people for "pussification" because they refuse to live in world where they have to carry guns around because others do so too, consider that it might have been courageous of some sufficiently large guys to just rush him. Some might die, but it would do the trick -- I don't think he was carrying an assault rifle. It takes some bravery but the people in a certain airplane did it.
I want to play Free Market with a drowning Libertarian.
Just FYI, before you pull comments out of your ass again: Probable causes of death (US) Heart Disease 1-in-5 Cancer 1-in-7 Stroke 1-in-23 Accidental Injury 1-in-36 Motor Vehicle Accident* 1-in-100 Intentional Self-harm (suicide) 1-in-121 Falling Down 1-in-246 Assault by Firearm 1-in-325 Fire or Smoke 1-in-1,116 Natural Forces (heat, cold, storms, quakes, etc.) 1-in-3,357 Electrocution* 1-in-5,000 Drowning 1-in-8,942 SOURCES: National Center for Health Statistics, CDC; American Cancer Society; National Safety Council; International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies; World Health Organization; USGS; Clark Chapman, SwRI; David Morrison, NASA; Michael Paine, Planetary Society Australian Volunteers How would someone 'steal a gun' if no-one was permitted to carry a gun? Kinda self defeating argument there.
Launchy.net changed my world.
Great. When you have figured out a law that will keep a criminal from acting, let us know.
I think, by definition, a criminal doesn't obey laws. That seems to be the real problem.
Now, add to that an estimated half a billion guns in the US.
Tell me how you are going to get them back and what kind of bloodbath that will involve. How many people do you think will die during that gun sweep?
You really need to work on your comprehension skills.
We should start referring to processes which run in the background by their correct technical name... paenguins.
Criminality ridden city, weapons all around the place (in the hand of criminals and the police mostly).
We never ever had a "school shooting" (bar the students riots in 1968, the police's bullets marks were still there when I went to HIgh School, but you will concede that is slightly different).
Why?
Most people do not carry weapons.
Spin it any way you want, it is hard time you have a look at yourselves, the statistics and the derided ammendment in your constitution that allows things like this to happen.
I hear the argument that if you ban weapons only criminals will have them.
You know what? I have no problem with that.
As the situation in Mexico City probes, criminals are not interested in indiscriminate shootings, it is a "tool of the trade" and the immense majority of people in Mexico City will never see a gun in their lives.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Seriously, how many of you people decrying the political motives and angles used the phrase
"The bodies aren't even cold" "Let the bodies get cold" or some souless variation?
You don't care anymore than they do, this is some idle conversation point for you to stroke your ego on, so stop pretending you're superior to that filthy goddamn Thompson.
These are people, they have families, and are not bodies for you to build arguments out of.
Great googily moogily.
Freakin vultures.
You need more psychedelic art in your life. rhesusmonkey.deviantart.com
You guys can count deaths by gun shoots by the thousends per year.
Killing people is lifestyle choice in your country.
In the UK it is national news when somebody gets stabbed to death, even more so when guns are involved (they are banned in the UK). We only have a few dozens of incidents per year in the whole country, most of them gang violence.
After the only serious school shooting incident in the UK guns were banned. Guess what? We have had no reocurrence.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Q: Did it really matter what race he was?
A: No.
Try explaining to them that in the rest of the civilized world (and most part of the not so civilized one) "school shootings" are not a familiar term.
School shootings are like apple pie, Coke, and McDonalds: all American icons.
Explain that to the parents of the kids if you possibly can, if you can't see the clear correlation between the crappy gun controls in your country and the applaing acts of random violence then you need to question your sanity.
I do understand if US people have the right to bear arms, but if you think that the people that worte the constitution had in mind every person having free, unlimited access to any weapons of their choice, well, I can say no more and let that poor logic speak for itself.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
In most cases where somebody is stabbed to dead, the victim is attacked simultaneously by several individuals.
In a one to one situation you still have good chances of survival even if you don't have a knife.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
For someone who was out to shoot people, armed students would've been obvious targets, not a guaranteed end to the situation.
That's part of the reason why you carry concealed, and is a reasonably good argument why it's preferable to open carry.
Please stand clear of the doors, por favor mantenganse alejado de las puertas
I think you are approaching this from the wrong perspective:
When some moron goes apeshit with a gun, I would like the ability to be able to defend myself. I really could give a flying fuck if you are "afraid" that *I* might be the one going apeshit.
I am 39 years old and have never carried a weapon off-duty (I occasionaly work as a security guard), however, I want to retain the ability to do so. I am currently surrounded by people who carry assault rifles openly at all times. As a matter of fact, they are _required_ to carry them everywhere they go, even when they eat or go shopping at the store. While there have been a few accidental discharges, I feel very safe.
Tell me, wouldn't you want the ability to defend yourself. Do you feel so strongly about not being able to defend yourself that you are willing to give up your life to prove it? Would your opinion change if you were one of the students being shot at?
strike
"Someone needs to talk to the tree of liberty about its ghoulish drinking problem." by ohnocitizen
If someone starts shooting and I shoot them dead, the first thing I do after making sure they still can't shoot me, is put my gun away. Then, I call the police and tell them what happened. They show up and ballistic evidence, eyewitnesses, etc. can prove who shot whom.
People are there to learn, not defend themselves, leave that to the security dept.Neither campus security nor the police (if these are separate) has the capability of defending you. Nor, is it their responsibility. The police have no legal obligation to respond and stop crimes even when they have been notified of the crimes and told you they will respond. This was very dramatically demonstrated in the landmark case where several women were held prisoner and repeatedly raped and beaten and the police never came despite having been notified and telling the caller they would come. One of the women even managed to get access to the phone to call the police again, but still they did not bother to show up. The police don't have the manpower to defend you and if you expect them to do so, you're an idiot.
I was talking to a guy whose brother was on a SWAT team, just the other day. He mentioned that they specifically arrive at violent confrontations with their lights on, and then wait 10 minutes before entering the scene of a violent confrontation to allow the criminals time to leave, as a matter of policy. They do this to reduce the chances of injury to any responding officers. Their job is to hunt down and capture the criminals for punishment, not to defend you. Ask any cop if it is his job to protect you or if you should protect yourself. Also, take a look at the statistics on 911 responses. I think they arrive in time to actually stop a crime from happening less than 10% of the time.
Obviously there has to be a rethinking of how security is handled and a way to know what kind of weapons are being carried in bags or in pockets. I'm all for gun banning.Guns were already banned there. Worked real well huh? For some reason the mass murderer did not obey the law, who would have thought that could happen? Laws apply only to the law abiding and passing them restricts only the law abiding. We cannot and should not turn the US into a police state. Gun bans, statistically, increase violent crime and murder. Proposing them as a solution is the worst kind of emotional crap. People search for some easy, simple answer that they can believe will solve the problem and so they can feel safe, so they support gun bans under the blind assumption that maybe it will help when it only hurts. I expect as much from the average citizen who has never taken a logic course and does not apply the scientific method to their own life, but I hoped for better on a forum full of supposed nerds.
As a former alumni of Va. Tech and former resident of Roanoke, VA, I would like to thank the Va. Tech talking heads, other liberal colleges around the state, campus police, Larry Hincker and all the other anti-gun crowd pundits who had a hand in striking down (illegally IMO) sound legislation (House Bill 1572); legislation proposed by the honorable Del. Todd Gilbert that would have allowed students and teachers, who hold a state-issued concealed carry permit, to carry a concealed gun on campus(es).
u m+HB1572
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By there very unconstitutional actions they were complicit and abeted Cho Seung-Hui in the killings of 33 students yesterday at Va. Tech. There is no guarantee, but if the students/teachers of Va. tech would have been allowed to lawfully carry a concealed weapon on campus (without the fear of ejection from the college) this tragedy may have been averted. My sympathies to the families who have been affected by this insane action by a seriously disturbed murderer.
HB 1572
http://leg1.state.va.us/cgi-bin/legp504.exe?061+s
Virginia Tech's ban on guns may draw legal fire
http://www.roanoke.com/news/nrv/wb/xp-21770
A bill being considered in the House of Delegates challenges the authority of public universities to restrict weapons on campus.
http://www.roanoke.com/politics/wb/49915
Gun bill gets shot down by panel
http://www.roanoke.com/politics/wb/50658
College spokesman celebrated 2006 defeat because it would help make campus safe
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ART
Va. Tech: Gunman Student From S. Korea
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/04/17/ap/nati