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World Reacts To The Worst Mass Shooting In U.S. History (cnn.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from CNN: Fifty people were killed inside Pulse, a gay nightclub, Orlando Police Chief John Mina and other officials said Sunday morning, just hours after a shooter opened fire in the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history. At least 53 more people were injured, Mina said. Police have shot and killed the gunman, he told reporters.

The shooter is not from the Orlando area, Mina said. He has been identified as Omar Saddiqui Mateen, 29, of Fort Pierce, about 120 miles southeast of Orlando, two law enforcement officials tell CNN.

Orlando authorities said they consider the violence an act of domestic terror. The FBI is involved. While investigators are exploring all angles, they "have suggestions the individual has leanings towards (Islamic terrorism), but right now we can't say definitely..."

In the discussion on this submission, Slashdot readers reported that Reddit is among the sites that have removed some discussions about the shooter's identity, with one reader even reporting "Posts directing people where and how to give blood have been removed."

15 of 1,718 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Omar Saddiqui Mateen? by Fragnet · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Islamic extremist and mentally ill. Though I don't think it's possible to be an Islamic extremist without also being mentally ill.

  2. To those who claim that PC does not exist... by Applehu+Akbar · · Score: 5, Insightful

    While investigators are exploring all angles, they "have suggestions the individual has leanings towards (Islamic terrorism), but right now we can't say definitely..."

    This statement is about a perp who called 911 and proclaimed himself an agent of ISIS

  3. our surveillance state failed to prevent it. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    No matter what you think about the civil rights aspect of our surveillance state, it is increasingly clear that it does not not work.

    However, instead of calls to disband it, I'm sure there will be calls to make it even more intrusive. And there is no limit to that. If another event happens, we must not be surveilling the population enough...

  4. Re:Omar Saddiqui Mateen? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Buddhist?

    American(NY in fact) born citizen with from what I hear Afghani immigrant parents, working as an armed security guard for a courthouse in Florida. Oh, and was also investigated and cleared TWICEby the FBI for possible ties to Islamic extremism.

    It is important to also remember that there are a lot of Christians in this country with not too dissimilar views towards homosexuality than what radical Islam does. In fact when I first saw "Shooting at gay nightclub" this morning my first assumption was that some anti-gay marriage person had gone off their rocker.

    When a Christian does it, it's considered anomalous, mentally sick behavior, but when it's a Muslim, literally no one is surprised. I'm not criticizing the attitude, I just think it's interesting how it really doesn't matter if an Islamist is ill when he commits an atrocity like this. I figured that probably says something about the state of Islam when people really just want to ignore the sorts of differences that define Islamic mass-killings.

  5. Re:Omar Saddiqui Mateen? by KiloByte · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Though I don't think it's possible to be an Islamic extremist without also being mentally ill.

    Applies to all religions, actually.

    --
    The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
  6. Re:Omar Saddiqui Mateen? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Remember, they're "moderate Muslims" until they grab an assault weapon and start shooting up the place.

    And whacko loony Fundamentalist Christians are just "Christians" until they make fertilizer bombs, execute doctors and shoot up clinics and patients, target blacks, target Muslims...

  7. Re: Omar Saddiqui Mateen? by epyT-R · · Score: 5, Insightful

    No, it can't. It is lack of belief in deities, and, by extension, the supernatural. Usually the people claiming it is a religion are religious themselves and do it because they can't handle the possibility of people having morality that lacks dependency on the supernatural.

  8. ROTFL. Prettier weapons would solve it by raymorris · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The two laws you mention ban weapons based largely on APPEARANCE, not functionality, and they don't mention at all the type of guns most often used in murders. You're advocating "scary looking" guns. Exactly what difference do you think a barrel shroud or folding stock would make?

    Here's a look at the effectiveness of the "assault weapons" ban from the Washington Post:

    https://www.washingtonpost.com...

  9. Re: Omar Saddiqui Mateen? by HornWumpus · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Talk to a shrink, lose your right to own a gun...No unintended consequences in that.

    --
    John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
  10. Re: Omar Saddiqui Mateen? by sumdumass · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Should being on a watch list bar you from having due process, the protection from self incrimination, or free from unreasonable searches and seizures? Should it allow your speech to be silenced by the government? Should it bar you from being able to vote?

    If you can bar any constitutional right by simply being on a watch list, you can be denied any rights for being on a watch list.

  11. Re: Omar Saddiqui Mateen? by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Insightful

    How can atheism be a religion?

    Atheism is a religion like not collecting stamps is a hobby. -- Penn Jillette

  12. Re: Omar Saddiqui Mateen? by MBGMorden · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I have, however, run into atheists who are every bit as zealous and annoying as the people they love to publicly hate.

    In all fairness, that's about the only type of atheists you're GOING to run into - or at least realize it. The ones that silently ignore people when they start talking about religion aren't really gonna make much of a lasting impression.

    Generally religious people aren't hurting anyone - and religion actually keeps some people inline who wouldn't be mentally strong enough to behave without fear of consequences in the afterlife. As such most of them I'm happy to let believe whatever they want.

    --
    "People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
  13. Re: Omar Saddiqui Mateen? by Ol+Olsoc · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Perhaps you have never lived in a Communist country, which were by law atheistic. The Gulags were filled with religious and priests.

    Any country can have an official religion, or no religion. Neither have a monopoly on morality, or immorality.

    Myself, I tend to think that morality is based on some pretty simple concepts, like the golden rule. Treat others as you would like to be treated.

    What I find disturbing is that many religious people believe that all morality comes from religion, ant we would be rapists, murders, and child molesters except for belief in their particular Gawd.

    I do tend to bring that conversation to an embarrasing halt when I say " You just said that the only thing keeping you from being a rapist, murderer and child molester is fear of your gawd punishing you!"

    Me? I don't do that kind of stuff because I know it is inherently wrong, not because if I do it, I'll get a toasty reception when I shift this coil.

    --
    The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
  14. Re:Omar Saddiqui Mateen? by Xest · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "That Muslim loon actually has a church preaching the death and destruction."

    I guess you never got to see a Catholic IRA affiliated preacher in action.

    Or Ashin Wirathu, the Buddhist leader in Burma that has been, and still is leading the massacre of thousands of muslims in the name of Buddhism (yes, really).

    Or the many Buddhist preachers in Sri Lanka that supported and continue to support the massacre of Hindu Tamils.

    Or the Orthodox leaders in Bosnia in the 90s, that preached in support of the Serbian genocide of over 10,000 muslims.

    Or Joseph Kony and his Lord's Resistance Army preaching that they're doing the Lord's work in killing civilians in parts of Africa still to this day.

    Turns out, bad people can coopt religion and use it as an excuse to do their bidding whatever that religion may be.

    You hear about muslims the most because that is the group that most concerns the Western media. Militant Buddhists in Asia, and Christian warlords in Africa just aren't a threat to us, so the media just doesn't care about those.

    Frankly, I defend none of them, extremists are extremists and are all vile human beings, but when people try and pretend that muslims are the only real problem it gives away a disappointing lack of global knowledge in an individual. It comes across as incredibly insular, that you're unaware of anything going on outside your own bubble.

    So sure, chat away about this being the biggest threat to the West, you wouldn't be wrong, but you can't rationally pretend that there's something inherently more problematic about their religion than any other. There are over a billion of them living perfectly peacefully wishing no harm on anyone just as most Christians living in America and Europe are doing exactly the same. Most people in the world are decent human beings, you can't let extremists win by falling into the hate trap they're pushing, by seeking to divide those of us who are decent people against each other. I'm an atheist and I find religion nonsensical but blaming a whole group for the actions of a minority? pretending it's inherent to the majority of the group as a whole? It's not a nice path to go down and it simply isn't true. It's also exactly what extremists that you profess to hate want you to do, so if you really hate islamic extremists then why are you giving into them and doing exactly what they want? They want division between otherwise peaceful people who identify with different religions because they see that as the path to holy war (jihad), and that's exactly what you're giving them.

  15. Re: Omar Saddiqui Mateen? by TheRaven64 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Animals do not, generally, behave as amoral rapists, murderers and child molesters

    Rape is very common in the animal kingdom. The notion of consent is quite difficult in a species that doesn't have language, but even if you limit the definition of rape to the male holding down the female and forcing himself on her then it's still common. Go and see how ducks mate sometime - three or four of the males hold the female down and take it in turns. Or look at dolphins.

    In terms of murder and child molestation, it's fairly common for a male (especially in the large cats) to kill the cubs fathered by another male that they displace.

    --
    I am TheRaven on Soylent News