Slashdot Mirror
Why Kids Kill
The images were familiar, yet surreal.
Media reports of books about "Doom," animated clips from the computer game, TV shots of websites with ugly images, ominous reports of heavy metal bands and film clips of "Natural Born Killers."
"What is known," said a CNN correspondent Wednesday night, "is that the members of the Trench Coat Mafia spent a lot of time playing computer games on the Internet." They had become obsessed with online killing, reported another TV reporter. They had delved into militia and hate-group websites, some papers said.
The fallout was, as always, nearly instantaneous.
In Vancouver, Washington, e-mailed Enzo Falzon, high school students were pulled aside as they came through the front door and told they weren't allowed to wear trenchcoats. In a Philadelphia suburb, e-mailed Tim, (who asked that his last name remain anonymous), kids who play Doom were offered counseling. In Maine, e-mailed Vektor, who's 14, his parents made him open his private computer files so they could look through and make sure he wasn't doing anything "anti-social."
By now, this schoolyard nightmare is as ritualistic as it is horrific.
We see televised scenes of kids running and sobbing, of SWAT teams creeping through schools and bloodied bodies carted out - followed by dark reports about hate on the Net, violence on TV and in movies. Everyone seems bewildered, uncomprehending.
Almost always, we are as confused as we are horrified, since young killers take their own lives or offer no coherent explanation, leaving us with questions but not answers. Since there are rarely trials, there is rarely any resolution, any understanding.
In June of l988, writing for Hotwired, I wrote a column called "Why Kids Kill" after Kipland Kinkel of Springfield, Oregon, killed four people, including his parents, and wounded 22 more.
Not much has changed a year later, especially when it comes to knee-jerk, ignorant stereotypes from the media and from educators about kids, the Net, geeks and the violence allegedly inspired by the digital screen culture.
Federal agencies and academics studying this kind of episodic, uniquely American massacre, find little of any, connection between murders and media, digital or otherwise.
Kids being warned and counseled by fearful administrators and teachers ought to know that overall, teenage violence is way down in America, at its lowest levels since the Depression. In supposedly media-saturated, violent urban areas like New York City, Chicago and LA, schoolyard massacres are unknown. Nor has one ever occurred in Canada, even though Canadian kids watch almost the same media as American kids, and use the Net in even greater numbers.
What do we know about these horrible eruptions? Almost all of the killers have been white, teenaged males who are emotionally disturbed. Almost all lived in suburban or rural areas, the children of working or middle-class families. They've been generally described as well-parented.
And in almost single case, nobody really knows why they did what they did. They suffered various forms of social cruelty and exclusion, as so many of their peers also have, and they got their hands on especially lethal weaponry, particularly guns. Almost always, their friends and classmates and teachers are stunned and disbelieving. Some of the shooters have been avid media and computer users. Others weren't.
According to federal statistics, no school shootings occurred in l994; in l997, there were four incidents. In l998, apart from the Springfield killings, an 11-year-old-old boy and his 13-year-old friend were charged with killing four students and a teacher and wounding 10 others in Jonesboro, Arkansas. A high-school senior shot and killed a student in a parking lot in Fayetteville, Tennessee. In Edinboro, Pennsylvania, a 14-year-old boy was accused of killing a teacher and wounding two students and another teacher at an eighth grade graduation. Two days later, a 15-year-old girl was shot in the leg in suburban Houston high-school classroom. In Washington, a 15-year-old boy got off his school bus carrying a gun, then went home and shot himself in the head. Now there is Littleton, Colorado, 1999's first school massacre, with at least fifteen dead.
Although experts, therapists and sociologists have crammed TV talk shows to offer various theories about the contagion of teenage violence, it is clear that no one yet understands why these incidents occur. Sociologists like Elaine Showalter of Princeton have written about media hysterias, contagions transmitted by the speed and power of media imagery in stories about the killings themselves. Some psychologists believe that when disturbed kids see the massive amount of media attention these shootings get, they begin fantasizing about this kind of attention being focused on their own, often unhappy, lives.
Other experts blame the availability of guns. Obviously, the ready availability of lethal weapons is significant in this kind of violence, but crime among teenagers has been plummeting for years now, even as the number of guns in the United States has risen.
And persistent efforts by journalists to link the massacres to hate-sites on the Net or to games like "Doom" and, before that, to "Dungeons & Dragons" don't hold up either. There are no consistent patterns of media behavior to link these killers, no single trait of movie-going, gaming or Net use.
Tens of millions of kids all over the world play computer games. The biggest users of new media recreational technologies are middle-class kids, since they have the money to afford the technology. Yet violence among this group, never very high, again has been plummeting even as online use has mushroomed.
Yet despite the confusion about the cause of these killings, all across America, newspapers and TV stations are warning parents about computer games, suggesting that their sons and daughters might be secretly turning into potential mass murderers online.
This is willful ignorance. There's no mystery about the greatest dangers to children. Every day, writes Don Tapscott in Growing Up Digital, three children in the United States are murdered or die as a result of injuries inflicted by their parents or caretakers. Of the annual three million reported cases of child abuse, 127,000 cases involve child abandonment. Each year, and throughout the 90's, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children reports only a handful of child abuse cases related to the Internet. Of the 23 cases tracked from March 1996, to March, l997, 10 involved the transfer of pornography, an adult soliciting sexual favors from minors, or sexual contact initiated over the Net. Of the remaining 13 cases, two involved police officers posing as children, and in two others the girls had previous histories as runaways. Nine others involved children over age 16 running away from home, allegedly to meet online acquaintances.
What these statistics indicate, Tapscott says, is that "children are 300,000 times more likely to be abused by their own relatives than by someone they have met over the Internet."
As horrific as massacres like Littleton are, they are also extraordinarily rare. Statistically, children are more likely to have an airplane fall out of the sky and kill them than they are to be shot in school, despite the staggering amount of media coverage.
Sissella Bok of Harvard, whose book Mayhem examined the effects of violence in media, writes that young people's lives are saturated with graphic violence in a way that's different and more dangerous than in previous generations.
"We have movie role models showing violence as fun, and video games where you kill, and get rewarded for killing, for hours and hours." It is, she wrote, a "very combustible mix, enraged young people with access to semiautomatic weapons, exposed to violence as entertainment, violence shown as exciting and thrilling."
There's no question that violent imagery is ubiquitous in screen culture, from gaming to TV. But these comparisons seem facile and unknowing. Gaming is intensely creative, in some contexts - Quake 3, Unreal, Ultima - almost approaching a new art form. The animation is rich and multi-dimensional, and violence is stylized, often presented more as a strategic challenge like chess than anything truly brutal or graphically violent. If the stylization of violence is a problem, it doesn't show up anywhere in crime or violence statistics involving computer users.
If Bok is right, it would. Why would there be a decline in youth violence even as "violent imagery" in the media has indeed increased, along with Web use, cable's share of audience, rap and hip-hop (also supposed to be inducing the young to violence), and movie attendance?
More relevant questions might be: Why are so many of these killers male and middle-class, rather than the poor or the underclass? Why do these assaults occur almost exclusively in rural or suburban areas? Why are these kids able to hide even severe emotional disturbance from the people closest to them?
Perhaps the most shocking thing about massacres like Littleton is that, for all of the massive amounts of coverage brought to bear on them, there really isn't anything approaching a consensus about why they occur. Since educators and authorities don't know what to do, what they tend to do is dumb.
Since the kids they're supposed to be protecting know quite well that wearing trench coats, going online or watching movies isn't dangerous in and of itself, mostly what educators and journalists end up demonstrating to kids is that they're clueless.
The biggest reason for this tragedy are the gun laws. Guns need more restrictions, no one should be allowed to own a hand gun. Hand guns serve no other purpose then to kill people. Rifles and shotguns on the other hand are used for hunting. You never see something like this happen in Canada or the UK, where they actually have some descent gun laws.
Damn Right,
...
stupid consititutional right to bear firearms !
What got me was in the UK we hear new reports about the NRA saying the solution to things like this is to have armed security in every school
Okay everyone all together, lets make this world a better place, god what are these people on ?
I think the problem these days is that people in the good old heartland of America are starting to see this violence. It's ALWAYS been there in the inner cities where people live in fear of drive-by shootings and huddle beneath beds to keep from getting their children shot THROUGH their house walls. The media just wants to grab onto SOMETHING to explain how this violence could have possibly spread to the suburban and rural neighborhoods... it isn't supposed to! It's supposed to be limited to those poor people in the urban centers. Well, it's time to wake up and realize there's nothing special about violence. We don't need to look for magical explanations on why children like to shoot other children. 30 years ago when inner city kids were killing each other they sure as hell weren't doing it because they got a little overagressive playing Quake!
I have wonderful caring parents. They are sensitive and understanding.
For years they had no idea that I was having psycological problems. My mother still can't tell when I start to sink back into old mental habits untill after I start to pull myself out it again.
It's not her fault. Part of my nature is to hide such things _very_ scrupulously (if that's the right word).
Now, if my history teacher had said "I'm worried about him - he sleeps every day in my class, without fail" maybe that would have set off alarms. I don't know. Maybe if...
(shrug)
These things aren't easy. I'm tired of hearing instictual parent-blaming. It can always be something else.
Yes, your completely right, the problem however is also with generall attitude, as mentionned above, the NRA response to have armed security in all schools ... that is the kind of attitude that prevents this problem being tackled effectivley.
Maybe more laws, certainly tighter laws and most important of all education.
Either that or just shoot em all !
(okay maybe joke in bad taste, but done to emphasise my point)
You can keep your lies, mister. These incidents of slaughtering schoolmates with guns have happened in the UK and in Austrailia--two countries with the most restrictive gun laws in the world. It's not what's in the hands; it's what's in the head. Do your research first buster, before popping your cork.
Yeah, these kids became estranged with their classmates and outcast in school because there parents wering active enough in there lives. If there parents had called around to the classmates parents and asked everybody to be nicer to the kids that would have been SO much better.
A 14 year old has a right to privacy just like the rest of us, and if anything parents going through his personal files (if a kid keeps a diary today, its not likely to be in a little book) is not going to make it any happier.
My parents drove me nuts around that age always worrying about where I, what I was doing, etc. And even now as an adult, I don't see the necessity. All it did was widen the rift between us - and feed anger towards them.
Parent negligence, like any easy answer to the reasons for these events, is far from the whole story.
And after we outlaw guns we should also outlaw pipe bombs as well! How can we as a society allow children to go and buy these pipe bombs?? We took the steps to safeguard our children by banning drugs and now we live in a complete paradise of a drug-free society. Children being violent isn't going to stop by getting rid of the guns. In fact, children CAN'T legally own guns anyway! No normal citizen could just walk into a sporting good store and buy automatic weapons! Banning those certainly didn't stop them. Banning drugs didn't stop people from getting them. The only thing that will happen is you'll create a black market for guns even bigger than the one for drugs. It looks like I should go buy a gun before idiots like you try and take away our constitutional rights to responsibly bear arms.
Yes, I think you will also find that the UK gun laws only got this tight after a school massacre and that one hasnt happened since.
I would also like you to investigate the percentage of gun crime in UK compared to America and then re-consider your argument
While it's true that the kids had bombs, I have not read any reports that said that anyone was killed by a bomb...just shot to death. And yes, if someone wants to kill, they will find a way. But guns make it very easy for anyone to kill. It does not require strength, stamina, or even much dexterity. Just a trigger finger.
If they had to use a different method, they would've jsut gotten their asses kicked. After all, the media rarely reports on drive-by knifings or schoolyard baseball bat massacres!
People with guns kill people, and easily!
I don't understand what makes people think that banning guns is going to do anything. I want one person to post something showing a gun jump off a table and shoot somebody. It's the person with the gun that needs help, not the other way around. Are we going to outlaw cars, airplanes, hmmmm let me think, ok of course butter knives, you can get a nasty cut from a butter knife.
Now, if the people that think guns caused this tragedy would have been watching the news, they would realize that the guns were the smallest part of it, what about the 30 bombs. What if half the school was blown apart by the over 30 bombs?? So, now let's outlaw pipes, everybody get rid of your plumbing. Come on people, think first before posting.
One thing people don't realize about "The Right to Bear Arms" is that this is not only to protect yourself from criminals but also from the government. When they wrote the Bill of Rights do you really think they were thinking about criminals breaking into your house like what we have today, no, they were thinking about a government getting out of hand or a militaristic government taking over?? No, they had no idea what was to come, they made those rights for WE the people to protect ourselves from whatever we need to.
ack, i give up, this planet is totally screwed, yeah, lets all have guns, blow each others heads off, then there'll be nothing at all to worry about, mebbe then a more enlightened species can take over this planet.
What does hunting have to do with the unalienable
right to bear arms?
Read the 2nd Amendment to the constitution find
where it even mentions hunting.
The 2nd amendment to the constitution is to prevent anything like Kosovo happening in the U.S.
Or would you prefer an oppressive regime trying to
eliminate a class of citizens by expelling and killing them?
The reasons for these shootings are not as simple
as "the gun made them do it" If a teacher had been armed and willing they could have stopped the massacre. As it is I have yet to hear of anyone at the school even trying to stop them.
Hmmm,
In case you haven't seen the coverage, those two kids used two double barrel shotguns as their primary killing weapons. How's that for hunting?
Good guns for hunting humans aren't they?
Blaming handguns for everything is just plain ignorant. Truth? Handguns couldn't hurt a rabit, whereas shotguns and high powered hunting rifles does a lot more damage as evident in the choice of weapons these kids used (runon).
Ask yourself next the last time you heard of a school shooting in Switzerland, where guns are available in every household. Ask yourself the last time you heard of a bombing in Japan, where propane cylinders and gasoline are freely available.
Knee-jerk stuff like "oh, it's guns" is the result of effective government propaganda.
"There's flies in your eyes. That's why you can't see them." -Joseph Heller
Scotland 1997 So you'll be referring to the incident which resulted in the UK tightening its gun laws then. (ie as opposed to it happening with our current laws in place)
No one can say you can totally remove the possibility of something like this happening, but you can try and make it bloody difficult
werd jon,
that's an article that really tells it like it is.
... good job man!
-keyh
Bullshit. I have never seen a gun kill anyone without first a person pulling a trigger.
The rights right in the consistution is free speech. If they take that away, then the right to have a tool to fight back is in the second ammendment...Read your constitution.
More laws aren't the solution. It was already ILLEGAL for these kids to have the gun. Are we just going to make it "more illegal"
How stupid.
Not having a constitution in the UK, I shall obviously have to kneel at the feet of the greatest Democracy in the world.
How stupid you say ?
Where the hell do you think they got the guns from in the first place, or did the entire line from creation through middle men consist entirely of minors ? If the people at the top of the chain weren't allowed the gun's, how would the kids have got them ?
How Stupid !
Just as guns are being used as a scapegoat here. I believe that a consistent, reasonable system of gun controls legislation is necessary, but that doesn't mean that taking the guns away will stop violence.
If I am determined to kill someone, I will find a way to do it. These children did not just have guns -- they littered the school with bombs. Now imagine that they did not have the guns; instead, they quietly place their explosives and set all the timers to go off at the change of classes. Now hundreds are dead instead of 15.
Cars are an equally efficient weapon. I live at a busy intersection, and an ambulance needs to show up about weekly. Fortunately, only once have they been transporting a body instead of a patient.
Here in Delaware, they executed a man this morning who didn't have a gun. So he set fire to his house and burned his wife, two of his children, and one of his child's playmates alive.
Knives, scissors, pencils, pens, baseball bats, golf balls, glass bottles, books, keys, staple guns, ice picks, and the list goes on can all be used as weapons. I know, because I have had to defend myself with some of them. Should these also be banned? "If guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns" is far too simplistic a solution.
I think you should take your own advice. Do the research and you will find that private ownereship of firearms prevent far more crimes than the number of crimes commited with guns. Look at the statewide stastistics and you will find that the states (the majority) with Concealed Carry laws have seen their murder rates drop along with all other violent crimes. CRIMINALS DONT OBEY THE LAW! What makes you think that gun-laws would stop them? Obviously it would not,guns can be obtained illegally just like drugs. All guns laws will do is to take away from citizens right to protect themselves and their family. Oh, BTW, what did Hitler do when he came to power? He implemented TOTAL GUN CONTROL, and look at the results of that. Please take your unsupported opinions somewhere else!
The American government generally controls through propoganda, not force. When they do resort to force, they have much larger guns than you will ever have, and more skilled people using them.
I totally agree with you, so would you rather be totally helpless or at least have something to try and fight back with whether it be gov't or just the occasional criminal that breaks into your house??
It's probably true that new laws would make no difference at this point. But if the attitude of Americans doesn't change such that they are more tolerant of at least the idea of more restrictive laws, not much will change. Consider that we tend to restrict things according to their potential for destruction, be it property or lives: anyone can ride a bike. You need to pass a test to drive a car, where you control a machine that can kill people, and we don't let just anyone fly am airliner, where a reckless person can easily kill hundreds of people. Yet no one complains about these restrictions. Why? Yes, it's true that a gun is a tool, like a shovel. But they have different destructive potential.
Lastly, remember that when the U.S. constitution was written, breech-loaders were rare, and repeating rifles did not yet exist. Ammunition was expensive, and people were better trained in their use than now, and understood what kind of damage they could do. When I go shooting, I'm appalled at the morons at the gun range, who happily point LOADED guns at each other as jokes! And remember, the 2nd amendment doesn't just read "the right of the people to bear arms," it also says "well regulated". Think about that for a minute.
Since he created the internet. :)
My comment is that we are continually focusing on the violence these kids committed against their fellow students. My personal belief is that this is sick and wrong, but I think explaining it away with Doom/Quake and Natural Born Killers is ridiculous.
Abuse brings one of two things, either quiet acceptance or violent backlash. Here we saw the violent backlash. Now I realize who I'm talking to here; I mean how many of us were insulted and degraded all throughout HS just because we could code a little, and we didn't exactly fit in?
My point is that these kids were abused and violated just like most of us were, and instead of meekly accepting it as their fate for the time being or even dealing with it constructively, they fought back. Unfortunately, they fought back with firearms and pipe bombs.
Just like the cornered snake who realizes that it's either fight or die, the state of these kids' minds were such that they wanted to end their pain and fear any way they could.
I'm saying that blame should also be placed on the people who emotionally abused them at school. That was most likely the largest influence they had. Not Doom or Quake, or a movie with Rodney Dangerfield in his oddest role to date. Just cruel kids. I'm not saying the gunmen were right in what they did. They should have dealt with it like so many of us have. They should have realized there was more to life than High School. But I'm also saying we shouldn't blame the entertainment media for the emotional problems of those boys.
Take away the guns?
Gee, what a brilliant idea...
The same thing was done earlier this century, by a man who told his people "Without guns there can be no crimes." After taking away all the guns, and with it a citizens ability for self defense, that man sent wave after waves of troops through his cities and towns and forced his own people to his beliefs.
That infamous man?
Hitler.
Taking guns away is an issue that dates back as far as guns themselves.
Think of it this way. A man breaks into your house at 3 in the morning. He's armed, and therefore assumed dangerous. Would you...
(a) Call the police and wait 10 or more minutes for them to arrive.
or
(b) Feel safer knowing that you can protect yourself.
I think only a whipped fool wouldn't agree that B is the logical, and safe choice. Oh my! The Kids! A parent has more responsibilty with a gun. Their job is not just to protect their families with it, but to protect their children from it. Yes, owning a gun is a double edged sword, but it sure beats a $3.99 plastic lightsaber from the local toy shop.
--pupkick
--beavis@pyro.net
Mancow.Com
Heil Clintler!
Well - there is also a correlation with personal freedoms in those countries as well. There is always a balance between freedom and security. It is easy to look at a very controlled country like Japan and laud its lack of violence, etc; at least until you are an outsider in that culture.
Well regulated was for the militia. "Shall not be abridged" is for gun ownership.
You're right - but that's just like Katz on Linux. He doesn't know what he's talking about, but *really* wants to be loved.
I don't play these games - they're fun, they might
even be considered social. But art? I don't know a Quaker who'd agree.
People who arrive late to a scene always get it way out of proportion. Katz is a menopausal fool.
I was just about to quote the exact same portion of Katz article, and for the exact same reason.
What *I* find difficult to believe are people - nationally recognized psychologists - saying that "there's no way we could have predicted this would happen."
What utter nonsense. After listening to a great deal of news coverage, I don't think I've ever seen a clearer case of worrisome behavior that was out in the open for everyone to see. A parent of a student that was threatened by Harris, for example, reported Harris' website to the Jefferson County Sheriff last year. The website reportedly had several pointed references to death and killing - essentially describing what Harris ended up doing. It was also stated that Harris produced a video as part of an assignment that basically protrayed him picking off jocks as they walked by. I'd be surprised if any reasonable person would hesitate to conclude that there was something wrong here, and it wouldn't have been that difficult for a parent to recognize this.
It's a parent's RESPONSIBILITY to know what's going on in their kids' lives.
I'm married to a schoolteacher now. Observing the kids in her classroom, there's a pathetically obvious correlation between which kids have an attentive parent, and which kids do well and are happy. And the opposite. Hell, even dogs need to be socialized, or they don't know how to behave well. We're more complex than dogs!
It's now a no-brainer: we work a few years longer to save, then one of us (as yet undetermined) stops working. The other is at home with the kid. Period. Ideally, she'd work 2 days/week, I'd work 2 days/week, but whatever ends up working.
So were can I buy these assault rifle seeds ? When should I plant them ? What fertilizer do a 155 mm howitzer need ? These are serious questions needing answers. I thing building your own weapon is a wee(d) bit harder than planting some seeds.
We must pass laws to outlaw the manufacture and possession of bombs as well. Those maniacs were hurling bombs everywhere in there and even left about 50 behind. Oh wait, we already have laws against the manufacture and possession of bombs so that must not have happened after all! Just pass a law to prevent these acts, yeah, that'll work.
First, people really need to put school killings in perspective, something you won't get from the hype-based media. Schools are very safe, much safer than driving down the road in our iron chariots. Where's the outcry for the number of people who die in automobiles every year? Of course, we've all been desensitized to auto deaths so there's not much to hype and politicians can't make much hay on the issue of banning automobiles. Watch out for the politicians coming with the censorship bills, they're coming.
What was one of the first thing that Hitler did when he came to power? He took away the right of the people to own firearms. Why did he do that? Because he wanted to enslave/kill them depending on their ethnic background.
Unarmed people are sure as hell easier to massacare that those that have to tools to fight back.
According to recent FBI statistics, 60% of all violent crimes in the US are commited by Negroes. This is staggering when you consider that Negroes are only about 12 per cent of the US population. When the Negro crime statistics are subtracted from the mix, the US has a LOWER violent crime rate than most of Europe. Of course many of us are numbed by the Negro crime problem and it has become politically incorrect to notice it. But day in and day out most violent crimes in the US are commited by Negroes. In fact, if you are a white or asian american, you are 50 time more likely to be attacked by a Negro than a Negro is likely to be attacked by a white or asian. Talk about your hate crimes. Each and every day Negroes slaughter more whites and asians than all the people killed in all the school shooting incidents. It is frightening to all law abiding citizens. This is the news that Slashdot doesn't want you to see because it is too inconvenient to their party line.
Kind of sad my first post has to be about something not computer related. I live about 20 minutes from the school. While no one I know was affected, it happening in my community is still hard to take. But what has bothered me as well, is the knee jerk reaction by everyone in the state. Trenchcoats are now banned in area schools, because "they are used to intimidate people and can conceal weapons." An upcoming Marilyn Manson concert has been cancelled, the NRA meeting has been scaled back, and the mayor was calling for it to be cancelled. Two gun bills in the state senate have been killed, both were expected to pass, one prevented cities from making gun laws stricter than the state, and the other allowed for statewide concealed weapons permits. None of this will bring the kids back or, but at least people feel like they are doing something.
There. Happy? It implies a connection between a regulated militia, and the right to bear arms. Read the Federalist Papers. Read any of Madison's writings, if you're an "original intent" person. Remember the Whiskey Rebellion? Duh. Read the rest of the post, and try and comprehend the concept of "context."
The more conservative framers even took the view that all able-bodied men must own guns, but they were bright enough to realize that this would require some training and regulation to prevent dangerous people from running amuck. There's a hell of a lot more to the constitution than just spouting back political lobbying slogans sir (or madam, whichever).
Do you live in the inner city? Do you really have a clue as to what you're talking about? I don't live in the inner city but if I would have to hazzard a guess (which I think that is what you're doing) I would think that most of the violence is related to drugs and less to random acts of terror. This was a pure hate crime. They didn't target an enemy, they targeted whovever they felt like. They hated everyone, it wasn't business it was a massacre.
All of these perps were outcasts in school society, yet nobody seems to mention that perhaps compulsary public education might be partially to blame for this. Public school is not a healthy environment for many people. I have no idea with the notion of the government helping to ensure everyone who wants an education can get one, but the notion that parents have to be forced to educate their children is absurd.
Everyone (Media in general...) keeps commenting on how strange it is that these killings happen in rural/suburban areas. Doesn't the thought even cross people's minds that if some deranged individual tried that in LA, NY, Bridgeport, Ct ;), etc., that that individual would be gunned down quickly themselves? Come on! With all of the gun/knife toting people in inner city schools, of course nothing like this would happen there.
Something that I find interesting about all this is that these killings seem to occur in rural areas. When have you heard about this in NJ or in California? These states are so densly populated that if these killings were 'random' we would have many. I think that many children today lack the sophistication to screen out the 'real' and 'unreal' from media and from computer games. Sometimes when I go to rural areas I see these 'MTV' CC's and they strike me as kind of creepy. There are people around where I live with bolts and rods piercing their bodies, and they seem suprisingly well adjusted in comparison.
My point is that many children get only the media view of 'hip' regions, while those of us who actually 'live' it really understand what's going on.
-Just some observations
I think these long-winded Jon Katz essays drove the kids over the edge. If only they had just set up a Slashdot account to block them! Just kidding. I think (at least, extreme) violence is (almost?) always wrong (no, that's not the _only_ reason why I'm vegetarian).
-- Anonymous COWard
Parents at fault:
,but don't do it most of the time and expect your kid to know how you look like.
,since they were not respected they eventually got to the heads and went on a rampage..
You guys hit the head of the nail. My girlfriend runs a preschool and it amazes me (me being in the tech industry, where its common) how parents get obsessed with working late...They come in late to pick up the kids. They never see them at all during the week it seems. Our industry makes us work late, but if you decide to do it everyday and expect your kid not to grow up funny or a strange quirk your an idiot!
I mean its your life- you got a career and you got to work late at times for tape out and sign offs
Both my folks worked late when I grew up but I
either had family help or one of them worked it out.
media is innocent?:
The arguement: "there is no evidence on the net or in the media".. what planet are those epole from. These people who make those arguements typically are not psychologists or have a damn degree on the topic. If they did they would know at that age 2-17 the child/kid is heavily influenced by the surroundings.
Why do you think they dress a certain way. Why do you think the trenchcoat mafia crap came from.
They were glamorized by the mafia in the media, thought it was cool and wore trench coats after seeing a few movies with school violence. Thay wanted to fit in and be noticed so they tried to talk about violent acts to be cool and get noticed. When people laughed at them
media will never admit to that. They do nto want to get sued, like natural born killers did.
They say "we only replicate real life".. really, I never saw that many things happen to a real person as I see on tv or video.
Next time you watch tv count how may times you see a pro military image of a jet or tank, shooting, explosions, car chase, or fight, and tell me its not influencing anybody...
Unfortunately I missed the Fox special on the night of the tragedy that laid bare the subject of why Kids Kill. For the rest of us, I notice two somewhat divergent attempts to address this recurring American tragedy:
1. Find the tools of destruction and ban them.
2. Find the causes of destruction and address them.
Well banning doesn't help much since this merely drives the transaction in the banned item underground. Drug use is still as prevalent as ever, guns can still be traded and so on. This is an immature way of addressing the problem - The criminal was high on dope and used a gun. Solution: Jail the criminal, ban dope and ban guns. Thats right, so when a drunk man uses a knife, the same should apply. What happens when a sober (unintoxicated) man kills with bare hands?) Banning is merely going to make those tools impossible for the law-abiding to use (Dope use for medical treatment, guns for the oppressed/victims, alcohol for recreation, etc) but will *not* stop those criminals who have no respect for the law.
The problem (in my mind) is one of alienation. We in America are increasingly isolated in communities that have malls but no soul. How many times do you see folks actively avoiding other people by withdrawing into comfort zones. The popular expression is "Cocooning" and I find this term very disturbing - insects cocoon as part of some transformative process - we coccoon to insulate ourselves from a reality we are completely unable to manipulate. People seem to be rushing hither and thither without noticing that its spring - staring fixedly ahead like a whole lot of robots.
Something is wrong with the youth of America - when I grew up in South Africa, we were united in hatred of Apartheid, but here there is none of this sense of common unity against oppression. Europe had and still has a whole youth movement which is active (to some extent) in its disapproval of the system. Here the deal is wearing clothes with corporate advertising:- Nike, Reebok, etc. The oppression is there (curfews, searches, drug testing, etc.) but the youth here seemingly turn their anger on each other. I would like to see TV's smashed in the street and fashion mongers chased - no, thats not the response, just children killing children.
It's true, we did have a mass shooting here in Canada (right here in Montreal, where I live). However, two things to remember:
1) This is one event compared to how many in the States? It's an exception that almost proves the rule, that these things *almost* never happen in Canada.
2) This was at a University, not a high school. The shooter (Marc Lepine) was an adult, not a child. (University starts at age 18 around here, not sure exactly how old Lepine was).
As an aside, Ecole Polytechnique (where it happened) is NOT a woman's polytechnical school. However, Lepine specifically targeted women.
My political science teacher asked us Thursday when we came into class: "How many people died Tuesday?"
"12" "15" "I heard at least 30 were injured" "12 died" "No, it was 15"
"I meant in Kosovo", he replied.
Whatever. For the record, I have seen a gun kill someone without someone pulling the trigger. Actually, I didn't witness it, but the six year old girl in the apartment upstairs was killed when her neighbors gun, sitting loaded and locked in a closet, went off, penetrated the wall, and killed her. That happens several hundred times a year, FYI (DHHS study, 1997).
Not that I'm necessarily disagreeing with your premise, (actually, I'm a little fuzzy on what your premise is), but I think your presenting a stronger case for gun control than against it...
Becuase up here in Canada we work hard at being nice guys
Their power is not distant and impersonal; it reaches into every home in America, and it works its will during nearly every waking hour. It is the power which shapes and molds the mind of virtually every citizen, young or old, rich or poor, simple or sophisticated.
The mass media form for us our image of the world and then tell us what to think about that image. Essentially everything we know -- or think we know -- about events outside our own neighborhood or circle of acquaintances comes to us via our daily newspaper, our weekly news magazine, our radio, or our television.
It is not just the heavy-handed suppression of certain news stories from our newspapers or the blatant propagandizing of history-distorting TV "docudramas" which characterizes the opinion-manipulating techniques of the media masters. They exercise both subtlety and thoroughness in their management of both the news and the entertainment which they present to us.
Even Slashdot is guilty of this manipulation. There are many posts in this very discussion that have been censored by Slashdot. Set your threshold to -1 to see the stories that Slashdot wants to hide from you. Then write to Rob and ask him why he is censoring news on Slashdot. I am surprised that someone could have a degree in science and yet supress data that may be true but uncomfortable to contemplate when this data is in discord with one's preconceived conclusions.
why does canada have less litter?
I think it is irresponsible to try and come up with one "unifying theory" as to why these kids did what they did.
Try this analogy:
These kids Brains= Win95/98/NT
Given: These OS's tend to crash a lot at inopportune times.
Given: the Kids better judgement "crashed" when they made the decision to shoot/Blow Up their school mates.
Are these "errors" a result of one file, or one piece of incompatable Hardware? or are they more likely a result of numerous probems that originated from a shoddy development process?
Circular references? lack of testing? External interference.
People arent as simple to debug as computers.
In Vancouver, Washington, e-mailed Enzo Falzon, high school students were pulled aside as they came through the front door and told they weren't allowed to wear trenchcoats. In a Philadelphia suburb, e-mailed Tim, (who asked that his last name remain anonymous), kids who play Doom were offered counseling. In Maine, e-mailed Vektor, who's 14, his parents made him open his private computer files so they could look through and make sure he wasn't doing anything "anti-social."
I had to read the above paragraph about three times before I realized what the subject and verb of these sentences were. I guess I'm just stoopid.
Thank you!
You've oulined my opinion almost to a "T". I dropped out of H.S., becuase I knew there was life beyond jocks harassing the nerd, etc. I was the only kid in my school with a laptop... But I got my G.E.D. moved to the city, got married. Now, 4 years after I would have graduated I have a house, two cars, a wife, and a great career in systems administration. All of the so called 'popular' people from my high school have done less than nothing with their lives.
Studies have proven that kids can be and are influenced by the media - particularly media violence. The problem is, many kids' parents are doing nothing to offset this. How many of you were told, up front and directly, that murder was wrong? Where do we learn this? Even I, who grew up in a religious environment, didn't learn this from my parents. I learned it in church, and I learned it in a parochial school.
Kids today have next to nothing to offset the ideas being proferred to them by the media. Censorship is not going to solve the problem. Proper education in the home and in the school would help, but ethics and morality are either not taught at all, or taught with little conviction.
Most adults today don't even have a sense of what morality is anymore. They think morality is objective, and that everyone has a right to make their own morality.
Well guess what? These kids are making THEIR own morality based on what they see and hear, and they're not hearing anyone tell them that it's wrong. They often have no other role models for their ethics other than The Terminator, KMFDM, and Duke Nukem.
In that case, I would recommend that tech people NOT have children if they want a lifelong career of late hours. It's just not fair to the child. Don't have children if you're not willing to commit the time to properly RAISE them.
Btw, I'm a sys admin, and in light of events like this, I wonder if it's really a good idea to have kids myself. My girlfriend does not want any, so if I end up marrying her, I guess my decision will be made for me.
Not sure what you are driving at here but your reasoning would suggest that guns are not the problem, its bad people with guns.
Think how different the situation at Littleton, CO would have been with a couple of well trained gun owners incapacitating the killers.
When I was a kid, I knew exactly where my father kept his guns... and they were not locked. This was common, yet there were no mass shootings in the schools.
I'm sure I could have figured out how to build a pipe bomb given little thought. I'm sure my friends could have figured it out. Yet there were no bombings.
The problem isn't in the weapons. The problems is in the kids. Even if you somehow eliminated all guns and bombs, they could come into school with a gas can and a match.
On a related note, even if your fairy godmother eliminated all guns from the US overnight (instead of simply disarming law-abiding citizens, which is what the proposed gun control laws would do), you would still have guns on the street within hours. Manufacturing a gun is actually a trivial task. (Manufacturing a *reliable* gun is not.) Ever hear of prison "zip" guns? Or the occasional zip gun from my youth that would blow up and take someone's hand with it?
The industrial countries which don't have guns don't have them because of laws... they don't have them because nobody has felt the need to manufacture guns in a machine shop in their basement. And the physical layout of the US (and Canada!) means that a total ban on guns would not work in either country. (Consider the uproar from the western provinces after a Canadian minister suggested tightening controls on long guns.) In large areas of both countries you *can't* simply call the police and let them handle things; the nearest cop may be 200 km away! I have yet to see a hardline gun control proposal which recognizes this fact. Waiting for a cop in the center of NYC or Boston is reasonable; waiting for a cop in rural Utah or Wyoming is a death sentence.
Jesus hardly has a monopoly on 'good advice'. And some of it isn't so good.
/EVERYONE/ were $cino, there'd be no reason for violence against heretics)
You might just as easily argue that the solution is for everyone to take up transcendental meditation, or even $cientology. (I mean, if
For that matter, some of what Jesus has to say is downright evil:
"For I have come to turn a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law a man's enemies will be the members of his own family." Matthew 10:35-36
Respect for humanity is the answer. How you get there shouldn't matter.
Don't get me wrong here - I'm not condoning murder.
Those kids went way too far. But I know how they felt. I was teased and humiliated by the popular clique since I was in grade school. I'll admit it, I use to fantasize about doing exactly what those two kids did in Colorado. I *wanted* to burst into school to blow the hell out of my tormentors. And maybe if I was more vicious and had access to an arsenal, I would have done just that.
There are many kids out there right now who are more violent and more emotionally disturbed than I was. I don't think this is the last time we will see something like this. Hopefully I'm wrong.
So who's to blame and how can we stop this in the future? First, I think we have to look at the kind of atmosphere we foster in American schools...one in which it's socially acceptable for kids to ostracize kids. That has to change. Adults can help by intervening when they see this happen (and I bet they see it all the time). Second of all, on a related note, mental health programs for teenagers need to be expanded and put into more schools. The programs just aren't there. There are a *lot* of suicidal, and potentially homicidal, teenagers who need psychiatric attention. Third, something has to be done about guns in this country. It's just ridiculously easy for kids to get a hold of firearms. Gun control has to get tighter.
AC
Cribbed from another /. poster:
The McDonald's case is interesting.
The coffee, maintained at a scalding 180F-190F because the customers supposedly "like it hot", caused severe third-degree burns. She spent seven days in the hospital and was treated with skin grafts.
Initially she only wanted payment for her medical bills but McDonald's refused to even negotiate with her. Consequently she contacted an attorney who had settled another coffee burn case with McDonald's. In the course of the trial company documents revealed that "in the past decade McDonald's had received at least 700 reports of coffee burns ranging from mild to third-degree, and had settled claims arising from scalding injuries for more than $500,000."
Despite knowledge of the hazard, company officials refused to warn its customers. "There are more serious dangers in restaurants." And given the 1 billion cups of coffee sold annually, McDonald's considered the number of burn complaints to be "statistically insignificant".
After hearing such testimony a jury found McDonald's liable and awarded $200,000 in compensatory damages. The jurors deducted $40,000 for contributory negligence. Also, given McDonald's conduct, the jury awarded $2.7 million in punitive damages, which was equal to 2 days of coffee sales.
Later the judge reduced the punitive award to $480,000. While awaiting appeal the two parties settled out of court for an undisclosed sum.
The #1 sickening thing about the whole McDonald's coffee hype is how it distracts from the facts. I suppose you just glibly believed whatever it was the mass media told you about that McDonald's case didn't you? Why do you expect anyone else to behave differently when it comes to the hacker culture (or whatever you want to call it today)?
True, the TV won't even show someone who runs onto the field during a football game for the precise reasons you state.
There is a terrible problem with the media in the US.
I am very glad no one brought up the black trenchcoats and guns of the matrix. Doom is so much easier I guess...
I've been angry at the media over their coverage lately. The reporters, to me, seem to be able to read whatever is written on their scripts without connecting any of it together in their own heads.
In the same 5 minute segment, they report about the Colorado shooting, calling it an insurmountable tragedy. Next they report how effective NATO was at blowing up a TV station (with people inside...), a government building, a residence, refinery, and on and on. Hardly ever do they describe these acts as a tragedy.
When it's on US soil (and you are not a fringe group) it's a tragedy. Otherwise it's a justified use of excessive force not worthy of a second mention.
And THEN they ask "Why do kids do these things?".
When the Pope addressed these topics, he urged us all to stop killing each other. He did not ask for more gun laws or more psycologists.
-Roger Dickerson
I almost disagree with every single thing that Katz has written. First of all, where are people getting this paranoia that the media is blaiming the internet or games for this event. I have been following it on TV and on various news web sites and that is definetely not the picture I've gotten. Just because the word 'internet' is mentioned along side with somethign negative, doesnt mean someone in implying that the internet causes bad things. I also heard that one of the kids was a soccer player. However, I haven't seen any soccer organizations up in arms about that. Mentioning that they played 'doom' and used the internet is pertinenet to the matter. It helps someone get a picture of their character. If the kids were star atheletes or active in community service, I'm sure that would have been mentioned also. If the kids did find the informtaion on the internet, then I want to know they did. Its called reporting. Reporters report on what happens. If the kids linked up with local hate organizations that would have been reported. Just because a reporter mentions that the teenager linked up with a hate group on the internet, doesn't mean he thinks the internet is evil. S/HE is REPORTING.
As for some of the precations schools are taking, some are ridiculous, however its better to be safe than sorry. And for the boy whose mom checked up on what he was doing, THAT IS NORMAL, parents are suppose to check up on their children, IT IS NORMAL. It is obvious that the parents of the assailants did not check up on them and school officials ignored obvious signs. I mean give me a break, hitler obssession, public mimicment of nazi salutes, massive bomb production, obsession with weapons, heavy interest in guns, ostracized from mastreemam, continued threats to others, etc.,et c. etc. While any of these signs alone don't justify a serious problem, all these factors combined DEFINETLEY warrent at least a psychological analysis of the child. Lets face it, the problem was horrible parrenting and blind school officials.
and people in general have less of it. Hatred is
an easy answer to try to explain all the atrocities
committed by people against other people, but hatred
by itself is not enough. The Holocost was not merely
a product of hatred and neither was the act of those
two (or more) teens. When human beings are reduced
to skin and bones and chemicals reacting, in the
collective mind of society, expect more such tragedies
to happen. We brought it on ourselves.
As for the studies, just one is the U.S. department of Justice's National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS)which found 2.1 to 2.5 million DGUs a year. Now please try and tell me that the DOJ is a gun lobby propaganda machine.
Another study is the _National Institute of Justice Research in Brief,_ "Guns in America: National Survey on Private Ownership and Use of Firearms," May 1997,SuDoc# J 28.24:G 95/3 (1997)
This was a study funded by the National Institute of Justice, and conducted by criminologists Phillip J. Cook of Duke University and Jens Ludwig of Georgetown University, on behalf of the pro-"gun control" Police Foundation (a non-profit Washington D.C.-based research group spun off from the Ford Foundation in 1970), found a reported 1.5 million annual DGUs in 1994
Even by the numbers put out by the gun grabbers (a truely biased source), there are 100,000 DGUs a year. Compare that to the 40,000 deaths. And those deaths include the justifiable homicides and suicides.
Bullsh*t. I've shot plenty at the range using a Desert Eagle .50. Tell me that wouldn't hurt a rabbit!
It's a good thing we have Jon Katz. He has all the right answers for our politicians and school teachers.
Now if only he would stop bothering us and help these poor folks and there "dumb" responses to this school violence.
If he was so omniscient, how come he wasn't out warning America of school violence _before_ it happened, as many of the politicians and school teachers have been warning.
And perhaps it's because urban schools have metal detectors and police at the doors that this doesn't happen in urban areas but more in rural and suburban schools.
So perhaps the answer to avoid this violence is to sacrifice personal privacy in schools.
In your comment you stated "The plain truth is that there will always be would-be killers."
If one of these would-be killers decideds to end my life, how do I stop him? He doesn't need to have a gun, a baseball bat, kitchen knife, or golf clud will work just fine. I could call the police, but by the time they get there it'll be over. I could try to defend myself, but I'm not very strong or athletic. I could run away, but I'm not a fast runner. If you take away guns from everyone, the strong can simpley dominate the weak.
I agree that if a killer doesn't have a gun, bomb, or any other way of quickly attacking people from a distance it's harder for them to kill large numbers of people. My problem with this being an argument for gun control is that these large scale murders are relatively uncommon.
I feel that an inocent person has the right to protect themself. I think it's wrong to make the inocent helpless in the process of trying to disarm the criminals.
I hate stereotypes. I was/am a jock, made all state football in HS and spent my saturday nights playing AD&D til the wee hours of the morning. I bet a lot of my fellow "jocks" did the same but were afraid to admit it in HS.
Stereotypes and blame come from a lack of understanding. bet the people who are blaming quake or AD&D have never played them.
As far as firearms. my father spent a lot of time teaching me teaching me the responsible and safe way to handle a gun, and range etiquitte. a gun is a tool, it's a tool for Killing. It is just one ingredient. Someone has to be willing to use it.
Note: once legally owned. A large proportion of illegal guns worldwide are guns which were banned by the government and later sold on to criminals by their previously law-abiding owners. In fact, a BATF study discovered that 40% of illegal guns siezed by cops in DC had previously been in police evidence rooms: in other words, 40% of the illegal guns used in crimes had been sold to the crooks by cops!
Compare the violent crime statistics of any large Canadian city to an appropriately sized American city: the murder rate will be much lower.
Oddly enough, there was a study a few years ago, comparing Seattle to Vancouver: two cities close together on opposite sides of the border. The murder rate in Seattle was higher... but the murder rate for white Americans in Seattle was almost exactly the same as for white Canadians in Vancouver. One thing America has and Canada generally doesn't is decaying inner cities full of people who feel they have nothing to lose from violence. Oddly, America has a higher murder rate in those areas. I wonder if this is related?
Oh, and even odder, the safest states in the US have lower murder rates than the UK. They also have much less restrictive gun laws. How come?
Oh, and odder still: in Israel many people routinely carry guns, mostly submachineguns and assault rifles. Yet the murder rate is lower than Canada. How can this be? Surely those guns must be making Israelis kill each other, those evil, EVIL, guns that take over otherwise normal people and turn them into killing machines overnight? How can this be?
Cut off the source of the black market (i.e. restrict the sale of non-sporting fire arms to the general public) and most of the problem will quickly diminish
So why is Canada's murder rate higher than before you started banning guns? Why is Britain's gun crime rate vastly higher than it was twenty years ago, when they've been continually banning more and more guns the whole time? Why do disarmers never care that gun bans have never reduced crime rates, while relaxing gun laws has?
It's much more difficult to conceal a twelve gauge shotgun however.
Yeah, it's, like, so hard to saw off the barrel the way these kids did (breaking federal laws in the process).
"And unconsciously, I was afraid to say it, I guess."
:)
I often find it difficult to say anything when I'm unconscious. I bet my subconscious mind thinks the same thing.
Sorry---couldn't resist...
Oh for fuck sake - Comparing with Hitler in this situation is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard of!
Obviously banning guns to the extent the UK has won't completely fix the situation, but it's a damn sight better than the state of affairs the USA! You people advocating guns need your heads examined....
Now don't you understand, man, universal law?
What you give out comes back to you, star.
Neverunderestimate those who you scar,
'cause karma karma karma comes back to you hard.
-Lauryn Hill, "Lost Ones"
You already have everything you need to fight back with - its between your ears. The information-plane is the real battle ground now. Use encryption!
:)
hahaha, ok, you got me there.
I tend to agree. Society was not the cause! I was a nerdy, sci-fi reading, computer game playing, staight "A" student who was picked on a put down in high school. I had many grievances, but I always had someone to talk to about them, my parents, my teachers, and my friends.
I believe that many people failed these two kids. First, their parents failed them. If their parents were more in tune with these two boys, they would have known about the web sites, their social behavior in high school, and their life in general. Second, both their parents and their teachers failed. Some teachers knew about the boys behaviors and how they were being treated by their peers. The parents and teachers should have been in communication with each other. A red flag should have been raised say, "Hey, something could be wrong!" Third, the law failed them. The boys had been in trouble with the law previously. They should have had some sort of counseling to find the root cause.
In this instance, there were many warning signs which no one payed attention to. Kids need attention, they need someone they can talk to, they need people who are going to be there for them and help them when the going gets rough.
I heard the other day on (I think) CNN by one of the people on there that there might be a correlation between school shootings and the Clinton Administration's tendency to use violence right away.
I doubt it, but just thought it was interesting...
After all, the [radical left-wing] media rarely reports on drive-by knifings or schoolyard baseball bat massacres!
You answered your own question. FBI statistics (even after possibly being fudged to support gun control by minimizing other forms of violence) report 1,523 mass-killings (defined as twelve or more dead) in 1998 where the sole weapons used were baseball bats and knives. 54% of these killings (a total of 822) were "drive-by" incidents.
And 927 of these unreported massacres took place in public schools (otherwise known as State Propaganda Camps, in my opinion).
The facts are out there, they're just not reported due to what I consider to be left-wing ideological bias in the major media.
Bear in mind that I'm using FBI statistics here. The (IMHO more accurate) figures maintained by the NRA are considerably more damning, but I'm aware that the NRA has an unearned reputation for fudging these things, and I'm not here to preach or start a fight, I'm here to persuade.
It's another little-publicized fact that government figures record no confirmed fatalities at all due to handguns in 1998, and only 23 due to long weapons (rifles, shotguns, "assault rifles", etc.)
You have a god-given right and duty to make up your own mind on the issue, according to the dictates of your own conscience, but you need to have the facts before you can make a well-informed decision.
In fact, it's obvious to anybody with a brain that the cause of this tragedy was excessive flatulence. The propane tanks were not a weapon, they were a symbol. When considered as text, the events show a clear pattern of acute intestinal discomfort, frequently relieved.
Think about it.
So are you saying those guys could have killed that many people armed with golf balls? Give me a break. Even armed with knives, I doubt they would have been able to kill and wound so many people.
Sure, I agree that a murderer will always find a way to kill, but comparisons like this are pretty silly.
Fact is, the US murder rate is a lot higher than that of other western countries. People also have relatively easy access to guns. You figure it out.
I first want to say that nothing justified
their actions. racisim, and facisim, and murder
of innocent people are purely evil.
but one might consider that these boys were
american, white, male, heterosexual, middle-
class, young, non athletic, and gun owners.
even without their hate-mentality, they
are arguably the most purely hated
demographic group in the world. every
problem from every country, every race,
every mainsteram social problem
traditionally targets one fo these
demographic groups for blame. (and payback)
and they were in all of them. before
judging them - perhaps more people
should take a look at what they believe
and consider that you in-mass may have been
hating them as much as they have hated all
of us.
1.
Mentioning that the TCM played Doom tells you nothing. I (computer nerd) played doom, my friend TW (actor and singer) played doom, a dude at my old HS, AS (popular dude, pothead) played doom, and the TCM played doom. It's almost as universal as "they watched TV." It tells you and I nothing. but to random parents and phbs and the like, it could easily be taken to say something about either them, or the game. And the fact that the used the interne reveals even LESS. my MOTHER uses the internet!
2. Re: the treenchoat confiscations. Katz shows why this is a bad idea. it (a) does nothing in terms of preventing problems. Do you REALLY think that if they were the "t-shirt mafia" or the "wallet-chain-mafia", or the "schwa-the-ufo mafia" that things would have been any different? (b) it's unconstitutional. See Tinker V. Illinois (c) It raises kids distrust of the school authorities. Even a 10 year old is smart enough to know that banning trenchcoats is entirely useless.
3.As for the boy whose mom made him open his computer files: (a) if they were e-mail, it's mail fraud and thus illegal. (b) You don't need to see someone's files to tell if they're fucked up. one of the TCM members had a table with SWASTICAS carved into it. It was a big table... how could you miss it??? (c) Additionally, if you're too stupid to know how to check your kids files *yourself*, you're too stupid to know if s/he is showing you everything. (d) There are better ways... try actually *talking* to your kids... That kid might never trust their parents again because of this.
-Dave Turner
Actually I've seen several articles at either cnn.com, msnbc.com, or washingtonpost.com with comparisons to scenes from The Matrix.
> The Bible wouldn't have things like that in it-
> thank the Lord.
Right, like God killing all Egyptian newborns in
a single night.
--ac
By exploiting the right of people to own firearms. He had a private army (the SA, a.k.a. Sturmabteilung, which IIRC later mutated into the SS). Let's not go overboard with the revisionism here.
Why did he [take away people's guns]? Because he wanted to enslave/kill them depending on their ethnic background.
Given the high percentage (2% is IMHO pretty high, and it's more than that) of hard-core private-weapons enthusiasts who embrace Hitler's goals, is it any surprise that they embrace his methods as well?
If the militias ever do seize power anywhere, do you really think the local JDL chapter will get to keep its guns? I doubt that very much.
Unarmed people are sure as hell easier to massacare that those that have to tools to fight back.
Yeah, just ask anybody in Dresden or Nagasaki who had a gun around the house. They sure protected themselves!
People are putting the blame for kids being violent on television shows and violent games. I grew up playing wolf 3D, doom, and I play Quake(2), and the newer games too. I also enjoy the action movies. I see the blame as being, for the most part, on the parents. Some blame goes to the school, but for the most part, the parents are at fault. I was raised to know that the violent things I played and watched were not real. That in real life they will hurt people, and severe punishment will follow. My parents even played Wolf 3D with me. But it was obvious that it was fake. I was not allowed to point guns at poeple, be they real or fake. I knew the hardships that followed death, as some of my family died when I was younger, including my father. Parents need to keep an eye on their kids. Especially when they are young. People seem to think that, they "are just kids" let them play. Or they think "They are too young to talk about death and violence." That is where the problem begins. Families that have problems should watch their kids very carefully. If they see a problem, they should seek help. The school also needs to watch for young signs of violence. Studies show that these type of kids come from abusive families. Obviously no one can make their parents stop the abuse, and take responcibility. But if a kids parents are abusive and dont care what their child does, then the school or other parents need to take action. Let people know, Social Service, law enforcement, etc. Those kids need to goto a counseler, and need a place where they can live like a normal child. Where they will be taught, and loved, and most importantly not abused. People like to point the finger at other people or other reasons, as to why their kid killed or is violent. But come on, your a parent! If you feel that Doom is making your kid violent, then sit him down and talk to him. And you ARE the parent, you have the control to make him stop playing/watching those things.... at least at your house. Keep an eye out for sudden changes, new friends, etc. The idea that movies and games make kids violent is absurd, IMHO.
Ryan
This is the best thing to happen in Colorado since Jon Benet. If you watched the coverage live, you could see them slobbering all over their microphones. If you didn't, I scribble down some notes at http://www.trenchcoatmedia.com
You're part of the problem. Do us all a favor and
move to Idaho.
Arm the teachers? Why not arm all the students
too! If somebody starts to shoot, everybody can
just shoot them, right?
I agree with you that it wasn't the gun made them
do it, but I think if guns are accessible every-
where situations like this are more likely to
happen. If it's harder to obtain firearms it's
more likely that somebody will have to think
twice and somebody else might notice.
It would hard to make people live in water..
Free men can live in water if they must. They are not whiners, they are doers. They can adapt. Overpopulation obviously IS a meaningless figment of the liberal imagination. If the liberals want to live on 1/4 acre each in bodies of water in Texas, let them, I say! Nay, force them. There is no crime in using coercion on people who can be logically proven to advocate coersion themselves. The whiners will call it a "concentration camp", but the FREE MEN will know better.
Anti-gun crusaders are addicted to the making of foreign comparisons which
.7 29.4 (1984)
.9 21.2
.67 9.28
constitute probably the single most pernicious source of misinformation and
misunderstanding of gun regulation issues. This misinformation and
misunderstanding (which are also involved in comparisons made across time)
result from a grotesque mix of statistical misrepresentation with partisan
selection and presentation, and sheer historical ignorance.
Such comparisons are used to argue that gun ownership causes crime -- a
causation that supposedly results in the U.S. having more homicide per
capita (i.e., a higher rate of murder) than do selected other countries
which virtually prohibit gun ownership. In fact, the determinants of the
relative amounts of violence in nations are socio-cultural and
institutional. The effects of such basic determinants cannot be offset by
any gun control strategy, no matter how well-crafted and rigorous. Reducing
availability of any other particular kind of weapon, including guns, in
general cannot radically decrease crime because the number of guns that are
illegally available will always suffice for those who are determined to
obtain and misuse them.
1. Do international homicide rate differentials reflect gun availability or
socio-cultural differences?
Two examples of socio-cultural differences that result in widely different
murder rates come immediately to mind. The first is the unknown (to
Americans) fact that each year hundreds of men in Japan murder their
families and then kill themselves. This is so much a tradition of Japanese
culture that it was not even a crime until fairly recently. Japanese murder
rates remain admirably low because they exclude these "family
suicides".{136}
Second, compare America's high murder rate to Europe's far higher suicide
rates: sociologist Seymour Martin Lipset has suggested that cultural factors
cause disturbed Americans to strike out against others whereas disturbed
Europeans tend to turn their violence on themselves. This helps explain the
details of American and European statistics set out in the International
Intentional Homicide Table, below.
In contrast, blaming gun ownership explains nothing because that
interpretation is flatly inconsistent with the international statistical
evidence. If gun ownership were a major "cause" of crime and gun
availability a major factor in the amount of criminal homicide: a) nations
where gun availability is as or more widespread than in the U.S. would
uniformly have appreciably higher murder rates than the norm for
demographically comparable nations;{137}; and b) nations which ban or
severely restrict gun ownership would have appreciably lower homicide rates
than the U.S. at least. Yet, as the International Intentional Homicide Table
set out below shows, the homicide rates in nations where gun availability
exceeds the U.S. (e.g., Israel, New Zealand and Switzerland{138}) are as low
as those of the highly gun-restrictive Western European and British
Commonwealth countries to which America is frequently adversely compared.
Moreover, the two nations which very severely restrict gun ownership (and
punish violation with death), Taiwan and South Africa, both have far higher
apolitical murder rates than the U.S.
2. Historical ignorance and the anti-gun crusade
Likewise, the historical evidence refutes the attribution of differential
international violence rates to differences in gun laws rather than
socio-institutional and cultural differences. Those who attribute low
European violence rates to banning guns are apparently unaware that those
low rates long preceded the gun bans.{139} In fact, stringent gun laws first
appeared in the U.S., not Europe -- despite which high American crime rates
persisted and grew.{140} Ever-growing violence in various American states
from the 1810s on, led them to pioneer ever more severe gun controls.{141}
But in Europe, where violence was falling, or was not even deemed an
important problem, gun controls varied from the lax to the non- existent.
During the 19th Century in England, for instance, crime fell from its high
in the late 18th Century to its idyllic early 20th Century low -- yet the
only gun control was that police could not carry guns.{142}
In considering reasons for the differentials between U.S. and British
homicide historically, Prof. Monckkonen rejects the conventional
explanations includiung gun ownership, remarking:
Virtually every analysis put forward to explain the [comparatively]
very high United States homicide rate has been ahistorical.... Had they
been proposed as historical, they would have foundered quickly for the
explanatory inadequacy of these "pet" theories becomes immediately
apparent in a historical context.{143}
When most European countries finally began enacting gun laws in the post-WWI
period, the motivation was not crime (with which those countries had been
little afflicted) but terrorism and the political violence from which they
have continued to suffer to the present day far more than the U.S. ever
has.{144} This difference is reflected in a practice that helps to keep
official English murder rates so admirably low: English statistics do not
include "political" murders, e.g. those by the IRA, whereas the American
statistics include every kind of murder and manslaughter.) The different
purposes of European versus American laws is evidenced by their
diametrically opposite patterns: many of the "Saturday Night Special" laws
American states enacted to deal with 19th Century crime banned all but
standard military- issue revolvers, i.e. the very expensive large, heavy
Colt. In stark contrast, such military caliber arms were the first guns
banned in post-WWI Europe, the purpose being to disarm restive former
soldiers and the para- military groups they formed.{145}
Moreover, if greater American gun relative availability were the cause of
international crime differences, the difference in crime would only be as to
crimes with guns. Yet American rates for robbery, rape and other violent
crimes committed without guns are enormously higher than the rates for such
crimes (with and without guns, combined) which are uniformly low among
Western European, British Commonwealth etc. countries regardless of whether
they allow or ban gun ownership. England's leading gun control analyst
sardonically disposes of the issues with two rhetorical questions: 1) How do
those who blame "lax American gun laws" for the far higher U.S. rate of gun
crime explain its also having far more knife crime: do they think that
Englishmen have to get a permit to own a butcher knife?; and 2) How do those
who attribute U.S. gun murders to greater gun availability explain the far
higher U.S. rate of stranglings and of victims being kicked to death: do
they think that Americans "have more hands and feet than" Britons? Flatly
asserting that, no matter how stringent the gun laws, there will always be
enough guns in any society to arm those desiring to obtain and use them
illegally, he attributes grossly higher American violence rates "not to the
availability of any particular class of weapon" but to socio-cultural and
institutional factors which dictate
that American criminals are more willing to use extreme violence[;
quoting a report of the British Office of Health Economics:] "One
reason often given for the high numbers of murders and manslaughters in
the United States is the easy availability of firearms.... But the
strong correlation with racial and linked socio-economic variables
suggests that the underlying determinants of the homicide rate relate
to particular cultural factors."{146}
3. If increasing gun ownership caused American murder rates to rise in the
1960s, did it also cause them to stabilize in the 1970s and fall in the
1980s?
The theory that widespread gun ownership causes murder seemed plausible to
Americans in the 1960s when ever-increasing gun sales went hand-in-hand with
(actually, were a reaction to) ever- increasing crime rates. But this
interpretation is exploded when the time frame is expanded to include
statistics from the 1970s and 1980s. In those decades, handgun ownership
continued to rise by c. 2 million per year, so that the American
handgun-stock increased from 24-29 million in 1968 to 65-70 million in 1988.
Yet homicide actually fell somewhat and handgun (and other gun) homicides
decreased markedly.{147} The point is even more striking in comparison to
the English homicide rate: in 1974 the American rate was 40 times the
English; 15 years (and 30 million more American handguns) later, the
American rate was only ten times greater.{148} Since this trend occurred in
decades in which English gun law severity increased, both administratively
and by added legislative rstrictions, it cannot be explained by attributing
murder to widespread gun availability.
The attribution is further undermined if violent crimes are differentiated
by type. Anti-gun academic crusaders do not claim that buying a handgun
suddenly turns otherwise law abiding people to rape, robbery and burglary.
Yet it was such crimes (and murder in the course of them) that grew
spectacularly from the mid-1960s on. In contrast, there was no increase in
the domestic homicides the sages theorize guns cause. (Indeed, the c. 100%
increase in handguns in the era 1968-79 was followed by a 26.6% decrease in
domestic homicide from 1984 on -- despite the addition of another c.
2,000,000 handguns in 1980 and each succeeding year.{149})
4. Concealing the declining American murder trend by combining suicide and
murder statistics
Anti-gun sages have seized on a new device in order not to have to deal with
these embarrassing facts. They conceal the fact of declining American
homicide (particularly gun homicide) by adding in suicide figures, producing
a combined "Intentional Homicide" rate which they then claim to be "caused"
by widespread gun ownership.{150} Yet these same anti-gun academics continue
to compare the American murder rate (alone) to the murder rates of specially
selected foreign countries -- without mentioning that virtually every
country they select to compare has enormously higher suicide rate than the
U.S. For instance, Prof. Baker, the originator of the combined
homicide-suicide approach, compares American and Danish murder rates,
placing great emphasis on the fact that the American rate is higher by about
7 per 100,000 population. Yet Baker somehow forgets to mention that making
the same comparison as to suicide rate would show the Danish rate to be much
higher yet than the American: higher by 16.5 deaths per hundred thousand.
Nor, of course, does Baker mention that when suicide and murder figures are
combined according to the Baker method, the Danish death rate per 100,000
population is almost 50% higher than the American.{151}
Despite their reliance on international murder comparisons, none of the
anti-gun academics who apply the combined murder- suicide figure approach
(in describing American figures) follow the combined figure approach when
making those international comparisons. Could that have anything to do with
the following facts which emerge from the International Intentional Homicide
Table (below): that of 18 nations for which figures were available, the U.S.
ranks only 11th in intentional homicide; that its combined homicide/suicide
rate is less than half of the suicide rate alone in gun-banning Hungary and
less than 1/3 the suicide rate alone of gun-banning Rumania; that New
Zealand ranks 16th despite a rate of gun ownership that far exceeds the
U.S.'; and that the lowest rate on the Table is for Israel, a country that
actually encourages and requires almost universal gun ownership.
INTERNATIONAL INTENTIONAL HOMICIDE TABLE
Table is based on figures from two different sources (as further specified
below): insofar as they are given therein, all figures are from the 1983-6
averages in Killias' Tables 1 & 2;{152} insofar as Killias does not give
figures they are from the latest year listed for the country in U.N.
DEMOGRAPHIC YEARBOOK-1985 (published, 1987). Figures from Killias are in
bold face; all other figures are in ordinary type.
Country Suicide Homicide TOTAL
RUMANIA 66.2 n.a. 66.2 (1984)
HUNGARY 45.9 n.a. 45.9 (1983)
DENMARK 28.7
AUSTRIA 26.9 1.5 28.4 (1984)
FINLAND 24.4 (1983) 2.86 27.2
FRANCE 21.8 (1983) 4.36 26.16
SWITZERLAND 24.45 1.13 25.58
BELGIUM 23.15 1.85 25.
W. GERMANY 20.37 1.48 21.85
JAPAN 20.3
U.S. 12.2 (1982) 7.59 19.79
CANADA 13.94 2.6 16.54
NORWAY 14.5 (1984) 1.16 15.66
N. IRELAND 9.0 6.0 15.0
(Homicide rate may not include "political" homicides)
AUSTRALIA 11.58 1.95 13.53
NEW ZEALAND 9.7 1.6 24.5
ENGLAND/WALES 8.61
(Homicide rate does not include "political" homicides)
ISRAEL 6. 2. 8.
The evidence from international comparisons is confirmed by the various
neutral attempts to determine whether gun ownership causes violence
footnoted earlier and by the most extensive and methodologically
sophisticated study, Kleck's application of modern, computer-assisted
statistical techniques to post-World War II American crime rate data. The
interactive cause and effect result he found contradicts that posited by
anti-gun crusaders. Kleck concludes that from the 1960s on fear engendered
by violent crime sparked enormously increased gun ownership among the
general populace. This increased gun ownership did not itself increase crime
of any kind (if anything, it dampened it); but an increase in gun ownership,
or at least in gun use, by criminals helped cause the post-1960 increases
violent crime, including murder.{153}
It may be of interest that Kleck simultaneously investigated the possible
effect of the cessation of capital punishment of the 1960s and '70s in
causing the crime wave. He concludes that the increased violence was also
not attributable to the cessation of capital punishment caused. Note also
that this criminological evidence does not support the gun lobby's myopic
opposition to gun controls. On the contrary, Kleck endorses sweeping,
strongly enforced laws against possession of any kind of firearm by persons
convicted of any kind of felony.{154}
Guns are more lethal than some other means of death, though less lethal than
others such as hanging, certain poisons and falls from great heights.
Because of their lethality guns may facilitate murder or suicide among those
inclined to them anyway. On the other hand, they are also incomparably the
most effective means by which a victim may resist violent attack.
REFERENCES:
136. R. Markman & D. Bosco, ALONE WITH THE DEVIL 342ff., (1989); indeed, 17%
of all Japanese homicide consists in children so killed by their
parents. Jameson, "Parent-Child Suicides Frequent in Japan", March 28,
1981 HARTFORD COURANT.
137. Likewise studies of geographical areas within the U.S. should show
those with higher gun ownership having more murder. Yet the consistent
result of studies attempting to link gun ownership to violence rates is
either no relationship or a negative one, i.e. that urban and other
areas with higher gun ownership have less violence than demographically
comparable areas with lower gun ownership. See, e.g. Murray, "Handguns,
Gun Control Law and Firearm Violence", 23 SOCIAL PROBLEMS 81 (1975);
Lizotte & Bordua and Bordua & Lizotte, above; Kleck, "The Relationship
between Gun Ownership Levels and Rates of Violence in the United
States" in D. Kates (ed.) FIREARMS AND VIOLENCE (1984); McDowall, Gun
Availability and Robbery Rates: A Panel Study of Large U.S. Cities,
1974-1978, 8 LAW & POLICY Q. 135 (1986); Bordua, "Firearms Ownership
and Violent Crime: A Comparison of Illinois Counties" Kleck &
Patterson, "The Impact of Gun Control and Gun Ownership Levels on City
Violence Rates", a paper presented to the 1989 Annual Meeting of the
American Society of Criminology (available from the authors at Florida
State University School of Criminology). See also Eskridge, "Zero-Order
Inverse Correlations between Crimes of Violence and Hunting Licenses in
the United States", 71 SOCIOLOGY & SOCIAL RESEARCH 55 (1986).
138. For discussion of U.S, Swiss and Israeli law and practice see Kates,
"Handgun Prohibition and the Original Meaning of the Second Amendment",
82 MICH. L. REV. 204 at n. 193 and 264ff.; cf. "Swiss Army: A Privilege
of Citizenship" LOS ANGELES TIMES p. 1, Oct. 1, 1980, "Israeli Official
Urges Firearm in Every Home, GUN WEEK, June 29, 1979; "Order by Israel
Puts Even More Guns on the Street", LOS ANGELES TIMES, July 5, 1978.
The anti-self-defense basis of Anglo-American gun control theory is so
unique that it produces profound differences not only in policy and
administration from those prevailing in other countries but also in
understanding superficially similar gun laws. One such deceptive
similarity is that the laws in New York City, England, Switzerland and
Israel all require a permit to own a handgun. Indicative of the
profound differences between those requirement is that: permit issuance
for the purpose of personal defense is routine in Israel and
Switzerland, administratively discouraged by New York City and
non-existent in England. In 1984 an attack on a Jerusalem cafe by three
terrorists armed with automatic weapons was terminated when
handgun-carrying Israeli civilians shot them down. THE ECONOMIST, Ap.
7, 1984, p. 34.
Equally significant are differences in policy re civilian possession of
automatic weapons. Either an ordinary rifle or an assault rifle or
other fully automatic weapon requires a permit in England; since 1934
possession of a fully automatic weapon in the United States has
required registration and been subject to a prohibitive tax and as of
1986 purchasing new assault rifles or other fully automatic weapons is
totally forbidden in the United States. But in Switzerland and Israel
the government distributes automatic weapons to the general population
by the millions. I was once asked by a puzzled Israeli why Americans
think they have to personally own guns: "if they have to live or be in
dangerous areas why don't they just check a handgun or submachine gun
out of the police armory?" The idea that American law would seek to
prevent law-abiding citizens threatened by violence from arming
themselves had never occurred to him and, on explanation proved
incomprehensible.
139. See generally Gurr, "Historical Trends in Violent Crime: A Critical
Review of the Evidence", in 3 ANNUAL REVIEW OF CRIME AND JUSTICE
(Beverly Hills: Sage, 1981), C. Greenwood, FIREARMS CONTROL: A STUDY OF
ARMED CRIME AND FIREARMS CONTROL IN ENGLAND AND WALES ch. 1-3 (London:
Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1971), Morn, "Firearms Use and Police: An
Historic Evolution of American Values" in FIREARMS AND VIOLENCE above
at 496-501.
140. Morn, id., Kates, "Toward A History of Handgun Prohibition in the
United States" in RESTRICTING HANDGUNS above at 13-4.
141. For instance, in the South, the region of the United States which from
earliest times had the highest murder rates, gun law experimentation
included: the only state law that completely banned handgun sales
(S.C., 1902; repealed 1966); the earliest bans on "Saturday Night
Specials" (Tennessee, 1870; Arkansas, 1881; Alabama, 1893; Texas, 1907;
Virginia, 1925); the earliest registration laws (Mississippi, 1906;
Georgia, 1913; N.C., 1917); and three states in which a permit was
required to purchase a handgun (N.C. 1917; Missouri, 1919; Arkansas,
1923).
142. Greenwood, Morn, above.
143. Monckkonen, "Diverging Homicide Rates: England and the United States"
in T. Gurr, VIOLENCE IN AMERICA v. 1 at 81 (1989). He rejects gun
ownership as a reason for the homicide differential citing a point that
it made below in greater detail: even those who see guns as the reason
do not contend that their removal could reduce American homicide by
more than 50%; yet if American homicide were reduced by 50%, its rate
would still be 500% greater than the British rate.
144. Naturally, anti-gun academic crusaders do not credit the availability
of guns in the U.S. for its relative lack of political violence. They
(quite correctly) attribute that to socio-cultural and institutional
differences between the U.S. and Europe. Yet it does not occur to the
anti-gun academic crusaders to attribute international crime
differentials to socio-cultural and institutional differences rather
than differential gun ownership.
145. L. Kennett and J. L. Anderson, THE GUN IN AMERICA: THE ORIGINS OF A
NATIONAL DILEMMA 213 (Westport, Ct.: Greenwood, 1976), M. Josserand,
LES PISTOLETS, LES REVOLVERS ET LEURS MUNITIONS (Paris, Crepin-Leblond
& Cie, 1967) [in English transl., with co-authorship and additional
material by J. Stevenson, PISTOLS, REVOLVERS AND AMMUNITION (New York,
Bonanza, 1967)], ch. 9.
146. Greenwood & Magaddino, "Comparative Cross-Cultural Statistics" in
RESTRICTING HANDGUNS, above; see also Greenwood, above.
147. For instance, in 1974, when the total U.S. population was 211 million,
handguns were involved in c. 11,125 murders (54% of all murders). By
1988 the total U.S. population was 245 million and handguns were
involved in c. 8,275 murders (45% of all murders), a 27% decline in
handgun homicide. Homicide by all means had declined almost 10%. In the
20 year period 1966-1985 murders with guns declined from 64.8% of the
total murder rate to 58.7%.
148. Compare Monckkonen, above at 81 to the International Intentional
Homicide Table, below.
149. Browne & Flewelling, "Women as Victims or Perpetrators of Homicide" a
paper presented to the 1986 Annual Meeting of the American Society of
Criminology (available from the Family Res. Lab., U. of New Hampshire).
Straus, "Domestic Violence and Homicide Antecedents", 62 BULL. N.Y.
ACAD. MED. 446, 450 (1986), Brown & Williams, above.
150. See, e.g. Teret, "Public Health and the Law", 76 AMER. J. PUB. HEALTH
1027, 1028 (1986), S. Baker et al, THE INJURY FACT BOOK (1984) 90-1,
Teret & Wintemute, "Handgun Injuries: The Epidemiologic Evidence for
Assessing Legal Responsibility", 6 HAMLINE L. REV. 341 (1983).
151. Compare Baker, "Without Guns Do People Kill People?", 75 AM. J. PUB.
HEALTH 587 (1985) (comparing U.S. and Danish murder) to International
Intentional Homicide Table, below.
152. Killias, "Gun Ownership and Violent Crime: The Swiss Experience in
International Perspective", a paper presented at the 1989 Annual
Meeting of the American Society of Criminology.
153. Kleck, "Capital Punishment, Gun Ownership and Homicide", 84 AM. J. SOC.
882 (1979) and Kleck, "The Relationship Between Gun Ownership Levels
and Rates of Violence in the United States" in D. Kates (ed.) FIREARMS
AND VIOLENCE (Cambridge, Ballinger: 1984).
154. Policy Lessons, above.
Have you ever considered the fact that the guns would still be made for police and military? Quite simply, removing guns from *legal* use will not even stem to curb a problem such as this. How do you think two minors got semi-automatic weapons in the first place? I assure you it wasn't legally. The more you regulate things, the more lucrative the black market on that item becomes. I quite personally think that NO ONE should be allowed to possess a weapon except for police. Maybe if we had cops with AK's on every street corner, things like this wouldn't happen, but then again, if we didn't have school, this couldn't have happened either. As you can see, there is no easy explanation for things like this. The only real answer is that things like this are going to continue to happen as long as the media eats it up and puts a nice title on it such as "Terror in the Rockies." Next thing you know, they'll have it available as a 6 tape mini-series for $89.95. The media does not care who is at fault. They know the answer to that. They are just more interested in ratings and making a buck than they are at preserving human life.
I have heard numerous people worrying about "copycats" attempting to do this on their own. I am sure that if the media wasn't making such a big deal out of it, nobody would *care* enough to copycat it. People don't copycat things that are a small article on the 7th page of the paper, just the front page headlines.
The real problem is not that these kids did this. The problem is that there continues to be so much persecution in our society that people can feel this hated and worthless. Every single person in our contry is responsible for this tragedy. Until people realize that, there will *never* be an end to this type of massacre.
But then again, I wore a trench coat in high school myself, so I guess I am just a neurotic who is going to go postal one day. Strange how this country is the only one with this sort of trouble. Shows you just how messed up we are. We are breeding mindless sheep, people who have no free thought of their own, more worried about what their neighbor/boss/friends will think of them than what they really wish to do. I am ashamed to say that I am an American.
I myself take personal blame for this. I have never been to Colorado, nor have I ever even attempted to murder anyone, but I cannot help but feel empathy for these two beings who felt so isolated that they felt this was their only recourse. Maybe we'll get lucky and someone will nuke America, after all, everything in Russia is for sale for a price, even nuclear weapons.
Soon enough we will have disgruntled students with their illegally bought nuclear devices leveling whole cities. I can hardly wait. The masses in America are so stupid and arrogant. Everyone wants to blame the video games, the Internet, and guns. Strange, I can think of quite a few other countries which have internet access, and video games such as Tribes, Quake, Doom, etc. Why does this type of thing not occur in their country?
Just my two cents, if you don't agree with me, so what? That is the joy of free thought. We don't HAVE to agree. Think about that before you post any "you are crazy" replies.
FeeDBaCK
-- The Land of the Free? Whoever told you that is your enemy.
Yeah, your right. Those bomb laws are totally ineffective at preventing this kind of thing and should be repealed! Everybody aught to be able to bring whatever kinds of bombs they like to school, work etc. Heck, we should be able to buy hand grenades at WalMart.
I know I'd feel a lot safer knowing that myself and a lot of people arround me were carrying grenades for self protection!
It's time we really got a chance to exercise our constitutional rights to bear arms.
Oh, and I'd like to have my own H-bomb too.
And here I thought this post was going to say something useful, and then out comes the "Some people are just psychopaths" excuse. From my point of view Jamm!n was starting to make a great point. America does have to blame someone (or something) otherwise it would have to face some very nasty truths, and those are:
Human life has become valueless in most americans eyes.
Hate and anger are standard, acceptable emotions in todays age, and are not dealt with in a constructive manner.
There are no moral, or ethical standards being taught or used today in homes, education, business, or government.
Our society is completely permissive with criminals, and our justice system is a total joke in which a person is guilty untill they can buy their innocence.
These are the basic issues behind a good majority of America's problems, and I personally don't believe that will be solved anytime soon since it seems to be the current trend to simply blame some simple abstraction rather than actually think critically on it for a solution. This trend will continue untill it hits critical mass, and only then will we consider alternatives. Heck, that's the American way after all.
Actually there are plenty of jurisdictions where it's legal for minors to buy guns and ammunition.
Outlawing guns won't stop people like you from getting them, but it will make you a criminal for doing so. That way we can lock you up when the gun is found during a routine traffic stop. And we'd be safer for it.
HA! and Bullshit!!
These problems lie in the fact there parents are fucking stupid!! So they are too stupid to relieze there kids were building bombs in the garage. Also I bet the kids were raised under the new pardigm of physical punishment is abuse(i.e. spanking). I bet these psycho kids were never disiplined once, spanked, grounded, forbidden from certain tv programs, said no too, etc.... I bet these little bastards got everything they wanted from there parents. And when somebody says no to them a couple times at school.. Hey lets kill everyone. Also guns is not the problems, hey it is harder to get guns today, then when I was in High School. So you think taking away the guns will make the difference.. Bull shit they little nutballs will just find new ways to do there dirty work, i.e. bombs, poison, knifes, maybe build there own zip guns.. etc....
It is the parents fault and the way they raised there kids....
America is quite screwed up at times. /. readers said in a previous topic most people think that weed should be legal,so why the hell dont they legalize weed and make guns illegal?
the source of this recent problem is simply because guns are legal and easily available.
as the majority of
ofcource im not for a second saying that making gun's illegal or not as easily available kids are still going to get their hands on them depending the enviroment they are surrounded by.
but at least it is a start to a very long term problem!
America and alot of countries around the world need to get their priorities sorted!
Only 12-17% of the gun armed resisters were
injured. Those who submitted to the felons' demands were twice as likely to
be injured (gratuitously); those resisting without guns were three times as
likely to be injured as those with guns.{128}
(It bears emphasis that these results do NOT mean that a gun allows victims
to resist, regardless of circumstances. In many cases submission will be the
wiser course Indeed, what the victim survey data suggests differs
startlingly from both pro- and anti-gun stereotypes: keeping a gun for
defense may induce sober consideration of the dangers of reckless
resistance; their low injury rate may show that gun owners are not only
better able to resist, but to evaluate when to submit, than are non-owners
who, having never seriously contemplated those choices, must suddenly decide
between them.)
-----
REFERENCES:
128. SOCIAL PROBLEMS at 7-9. The National Crime Surveys are conducted under
auspices of the National Institute of Justice (NIJ). Census Bureau
interviewers contact a nationally representative sample of about 60,000
households every six months and record information from personal
interviews concerning the crime victimization experience of all
household members aged twelve or older. Cook "The Relationship Between
Victim Resistance and Injury in Non-Commercial Robbery", 15 J. LEGAL
STUD. 405, 406 (1986).
You truly believe that the people can not protect themselves from government. No, I am not talking about one or 10 zealotts defending themselves in what they believe. I am talking about a nation that stands up to defend their rights from a tyranical government. If the government starts using our military against us, I would guarantee a great majority of the those people in the military would switch sides and fight for freedom.
Also, If you keep trying to ban firearms you will see alot more bombings as we did in Oklahoma City, and no I *do not* condone this action.
It's easy to point to a symptom and call it the problem. It requires no thought and it pushes the blame comfortably away from the people involved. It makes a good 2 minute sound bite on the nightly news. Passing the buck is the name of the game in American society.
If we blame it on video games or violent movies or rock and roll stars, people reason, perhaps we can distract everyone from the more embarassing questions that could be asked. Questions such as:
1) Why didn't the parents notice their kids were stockpiling enough arms to start a small war?
2) Why didn't someone pick up the dozens of warning signs, from the internet pages to the verbal threats to the extremely anti-social behavior?
3) All the weaponry they were carrying had to be pretty heavy. Even with concealing clothing, someone should have perhaps noticed something unusual (Like the 20 pound propane tank bomb they later found in the school kitchen, maybe?) Why didn't they?
4) Rumor has it there was a cop being paid to guard the school. Where was he?
Yes indeed, we can't allow people to think that anyone was grossly incompetant in not picking up the dozens of warning signs, so let's just blame violent video games, movies and rock groups.
PS: Three things I think that would immediately help prevent this situation in the future:
1) Mandatory police training for teachers. Yes, our society has come to that.
2) Mandatory psycological training for teachers, to help them spot our disturbed little darlings before they go off.
3) Reduce school overcrowding to give teachers a little more chance of spotting potential trouble early.
...and without any parents actually having to talk to their kids about difficult subjects!
That school system has banned black trenchoats and a Marilyn Manson concert scheduled nearby was cancelled.
Now I think its safe to say that nothing like this will ever happen again!
I'd been extreamly happy in recent months, more specifically in the past week. However, when i saw this littleton mess, i was genuinely saddened. As if 12 random people dead wouldn't be sad enough, the methods these two kids used in targeting their victims made it all the more chilling and evil. I feel compassion for all the people affected by this senseless act, but what really can we do? What worries me more, is that the old phrase, "things always get worse before they get better" will very much hold true in comming months. I'm sure us in the tech community have read a wide array of articles about the impacts of Y2K. In addition to consumer panick, increased global tension, increased spiritual conciousness, we all have probably heard reports that the suicide rate is expected to tripple this winter. With so many people bugging out before the clock rolls over to the big 1900, we can surely expect more incidents of similar magnitude to the littleton massacre.
so again, what can we do? All that i can think of is to keep our heads on straight, and not be consumed by the madness ourselves. I'm not going to let this nonsense change me. I'm going about business as usual. I'm just not looking forward to finding out how much worse it will get before it get's better. basically, my chosen path through this is the taoist one of passiveness. Knowing others is intelligent; knowing yourself is enlightened. Conquering others takes force; conquering yourself takes true strength.
iunno. this whole mess got me pretty down. i'm dealing fine, but if something else shitty happens, who knows. anyone else have any good ideas on how we can grow beyond this shit?
ando
Unfortunately, December 6th has become a historic day for Canada. Nine years ago, 14 women were murdered because they were women. One man entered a classroom, separated the men from the women. He lined up the women and systematically shot them.
I don't know if the act of violence are comparable, but is this is the last and only one you can come up with?
Another Reason I 'm happy to live in Canada
In my Human Georgraphy class we discused the school shooting and to try to see if we could find any paterns. we did most of the shootings took place in rich, middle sized surburban towns. mostly Caucasion area's. Liddleton was suburb of denver. Pearl was a suburb of Jackson, Mississippi. Springfield, Oregon was a suburb of Eugine. Anyways this patter works for most Jonesbourg an exception but that was really young kids killing. so i dont know what this means probobly means that these places are harder to fit into then larger cities. and in the smaller surburban towns you might be even more cut off from normal society then in the larger towns.
1. Do international homicide rate differentials reflect gun availability or
socio-cultural differences?
Two examples of socio-cultural differences that result in widely different
murder rates come immediately to mind. The first is the unknown (to
Americans) fact that each year hundreds of men in Japan murder their
families and then kill themselves. This is so much a tradition of Japanese
culture that it was not even a crime until fairly recently. Japanese murder
rates remain admirably low because they exclude these "family
suicides".{136}
Second, compare America's high murder rate to Europe's far higher suicide
rates: sociologist Seymour Martin Lipset has suggested that cultural factors
cause disturbed Americans to strike out against others whereas disturbed
Europeans tend to turn their violence on themselves. This helps explain the
details of American and European statistics set out in the International
Intentional Homicide Table, below.
In contrast, blaming gun ownership explains nothing because that
interpretation is flatly inconsistent with the international statistical
evidence. If gun ownership were a major "cause" of crime and gun
availability a major factor in the amount of criminal homicide: a) nations
where gun availability is as or more widespread than in the U.S. would
uniformly have appreciably higher murder rates than the norm for
demographically comparable nations;{137}; and b) nations which ban or
severely restrict gun ownership would have appreciably lower homicide rates
than the U.S. at least. Yet, as the International Intentional Homicide Table
set out below shows, the homicide rates in nations where gun availability
exceeds the U.S. (e.g., Israel, New Zealand and Switzerland{138}) are as low
as those of the highly gun-restrictive Western European and British
Commonwealth countries to which America is frequently adversely compared.
Moreover, the two nations which very severely restrict gun ownership (and
punish violation with death), Taiwan and South Africa, both have far higher
apolitical murder rates than the U.S.
2. Historical ignorance and the anti-gun crusade
Likewise, the historical evidence refutes the attribution of differential
international violence rates to differences in gun laws rather than
socio-institutional and cultural differences. Those who attribute low
European violence rates to banning guns are apparently unaware that those
low rates long preceded the gun bans.{139} In fact, stringent gun laws first
appeared in the U.S., not Europe -- despite which high American crime rates
persisted and grew.{140} Ever-growing violence in various American states
from the 1810s on, led them to pioneer ever more severe gun controls.{141}
But in Europe, where violence was falling, or was not even deemed an
important problem, gun controls varied from the lax to the non- existent.
During the 19th Century in England, for instance, crime fell from its high
in the late 18th Century to its idyllic early 20th Century low -- yet the
only gun control was that police could not carry guns.{142}
4. Concealing the declining American murder trend by combining suicide and
murder statistics
Anti-gun sages have seized on a new device in order not to have to deal with
these embarrassing facts. They conceal the fact of declining American
homicide (particularly gun homicide) by adding in suicide figures, producing
a combined "Intentional Homicide" rate which they then claim to be "caused"
by widespread gun ownership.{150} Yet these same anti-gun academics continue
to compare the American murder rate (alone) to the murder rates of specially
selected foreign countries -- without mentioning that virtually every
country they select to compare has enormously higher suicide rate than the
U.S. For instance, Prof. Baker, the originator of the combined
homicide-suicide approach, compares American and Danish murder rates,
placing great emphasis on the fact that the American rate is higher by about
7 per 100,000 population. Yet Baker somehow forgets to mention that making
the same comparison as to suicide rate would show the Danish rate to be much
higher yet than the American: higher by 16.5 deaths per hundred thousand.
Nor, of course, does Baker mention that when suicide and murder figures are
combined according to the Baker method, the Danish death rate per 100,000
population is almost 50% higher than the American.{151}
Despite their reliance on international murder comparisons, none of the
anti-gun academics who apply the combined murder- suicide figure approach
(in describing American figures) follow the combined figure approach when
making those international comparisons. Could that have anything to do with
the following facts which emerge from the International Intentional Homicide
Table (below): that of 18 nations for which figures were available, the U.S.
ranks only 11th in intentional homicide; that its combined homicide/suicide
rate is less than half of the suicide rate alone in gun-banning Hungary and
less than 1/3 the suicide rate alone of gun-banning Rumania; that New
Zealand ranks 16th despite a rate of gun ownership that far exceeds the
U.S.'; and that the lowest rate on the Table is for Israel, a country that
actually encourages and requires almost universal gun ownership.
REFERENCES:
136. R. Markman & D. Bosco, ALONE WITH THE DEVIL 342ff., (1989); indeed, 17%
of all Japanese homicide consists in children so killed by their
parents. Jameson, "Parent-Child Suicides Frequent in Japan", March 28,
1981 HARTFORD COURANT.
137. Likewise studies of geographical areas within the U.S. should show
those with higher gun ownership having more murder. Yet the consistent
result of studies attempting to link gun ownership to violence rates is
either no relationship or a negative one, i.e. that urban and other
areas with higher gun ownership have less violence than demographically
comparable areas with lower gun ownership. See, e.g. Murray, "Handguns,
Gun Control Law and Firearm Violence", 23 SOCIAL PROBLEMS 81 (1975);
Lizotte & Bordua and Bordua & Lizotte, above; Kleck, "The Relationship
between Gun Ownership Levels and Rates of Violence in the United
States" in D. Kates (ed.) FIREARMS AND VIOLENCE (1984); McDowall, Gun
Availability and Robbery Rates: A Panel Study of Large U.S. Cities,
1974-1978, 8 LAW & POLICY Q. 135 (1986); Bordua, "Firearms Ownership
and Violent Crime: A Comparison of Illinois Counties" Kleck &
Patterson, "The Impact of Gun Control and Gun Ownership Levels on City
Violence Rates", a paper presented to the 1989 Annual Meeting of the
American Society of Criminology (available from the authors at Florida
State University School of Criminology). See also Eskridge, "Zero-Order
Inverse Correlations between Crimes of Violence and Hunting Licenses in
the United States", 71 SOCIOLOGY & SOCIAL RESEARCH 55 (1986).
138. For discussion of U.S, Swiss and Israeli law and practice see Kates,
"Handgun Prohibition and the Original Meaning of the Second Amendment",
82 MICH. L. REV. 204 at n. 193 and 264ff.; cf. "Swiss Army: A Privilege
of Citizenship" LOS ANGELES TIMES p. 1, Oct. 1, 1980, "Israeli Official
Urges Firearm in Every Home, GUN WEEK, June 29, 1979; "Order by Israel
Puts Even More Guns on the Street", LOS ANGELES TIMES, July 5, 1978.
The anti-self-defense basis of Anglo-American gun control theory is so
unique that it produces profound differences not only in policy and
administration from those prevailing in other countries but also in
understanding superficially similar gun laws. One such deceptive
similarity is that the laws in New York City, England, Switzerland and
Israel all require a permit to own a handgun. Indicative of the
profound differences between those requirement is that: permit issuance
for the purpose of personal defense is routine in Israel and
Switzerland, administratively discouraged by New York City and
non-existent in England. In 1984 an attack on a Jerusalem cafe by three
terrorists armed with automatic weapons was terminated when
handgun-carrying Israeli civilians shot them down. THE ECONOMIST, Ap.
7, 1984, p. 34.
Equally significant are differences in policy re civilian possession of
automatic weapons. Either an ordinary rifle or an assault rifle or
other fully automatic weapon requires a permit in England; since 1934
possession of a fully automatic weapon in the United States has
required registration and been subject to a prohibitive tax and as of
1986 purchasing new assault rifles or other fully automatic weapons is
totally forbidden in the United States. But in Switzerland and Israel
the government distributes automatic weapons to the general population
by the millions. I was once asked by a puzzled Israeli why Americans
think they have to personally own guns: "if they have to live or be in
dangerous areas why don't they just check a handgun or submachine gun
out of the police armory?" The idea that American law would seek to
prevent law-abiding citizens threatened by violence from arming
themselves had never occurred to him and, on explanation proved
incomprehensible.
139. See generally Gurr, "Historical Trends in Violent Crime: A Critical
Review of the Evidence", in 3 ANNUAL REVIEW OF CRIME AND JUSTICE
(Beverly Hills: Sage, 1981), C. Greenwood, FIREARMS CONTROL: A STUDY OF
ARMED CRIME AND FIREARMS CONTROL IN ENGLAND AND WALES ch. 1-3 (London:
Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1971), Morn, "Firearms Use and Police: An
Historic Evolution of American Values" in FIREARMS AND VIOLENCE above
at 496-501.
140. Morn, id., Kates, "Toward A History of Handgun Prohibition in the
United States" in RESTRICTING HANDGUNS above at 13-4.
141. For instance, in the South, the region of the United States which from
earliest times had the highest murder rates, gun law experimentation
included: the only state law that completely banned handgun sales
(S.C., 1902; repealed 1966); the earliest bans on "Saturday Night
Specials" (Tennessee, 1870; Arkansas, 1881; Alabama, 1893; Texas, 1907;
Virginia, 1925); the earliest registration laws (Mississippi, 1906;
Georgia, 1913; N.C., 1917); and three states in which a permit was
required to purchase a handgun (N.C. 1917; Missouri, 1919; Arkansas,
1923).
142. Greenwood, Morn, above.
143. Monckkonen, "Diverging Homicide Rates: England and the United States"
in T. Gurr, VIOLENCE IN AMERICA v. 1 at 81 (1989). He rejects gun
ownership as a reason for the homicide differential citing a point that
it made below in greater detail: even those who see guns as the reason
do not contend that their removal could reduce American homicide by
more than 50%; yet if American homicide were reduced by 50%, its rate
would still be 500% greater than the British rate.
144. Naturally, anti-gun academic crusaders do not credit the availability
of guns in the U.S. for its relative lack of political violence. They
(quite correctly) attribute that to socio-cultural and institutional
differences between the U.S. and Europe. Yet it does not occur to the
anti-gun academic crusaders to attribute international crime
differentials to socio-cultural and institutional differences rather
than differential gun ownership.
145. L. Kennett and J. L. Anderson, THE GUN IN AMERICA: THE ORIGINS OF A
NATIONAL DILEMMA 213 (Westport, Ct.: Greenwood, 1976), M. Josserand,
LES PISTOLETS, LES REVOLVERS ET LEURS MUNITIONS (Paris, Crepin-Leblond
& Cie, 1967) [in English transl., with co-authorship and additional
material by J. Stevenson, PISTOLS, REVOLVERS AND AMMUNITION (New York,
Bonanza, 1967)], ch. 9.
146. Greenwood & Magaddino, "Comparative Cross-Cultural Statistics" in
RESTRICTING HANDGUNS, above; see also Greenwood, above.
147. For instance, in 1974, when the total U.S. population was 211 million,
handguns were involved in c. 11,125 murders (54% of all murders). By
1988 the total U.S. population was 245 million and handguns were
involved in c. 8,275 murders (45% of all murders), a 27% decline in
handgun homicide. Homicide by all means had declined almost 10%. In the
20 year period 1966-1985 murders with guns declined from 64.8% of the
total murder rate to 58.7%.
148. Compare Monckkonen, above at 81 to the International Intentional
Homicide Table, below.
149. Browne & Flewelling, "Women as Victims or Perpetrators of Homicide" a
paper presented to the 1986 Annual Meeting of the American Society of
Criminology (available from the Family Res. Lab., U. of New Hampshire).
Straus, "Domestic Violence and Homicide Antecedents", 62 BULL. N.Y.
ACAD. MED. 446, 450 (1986), Brown & Williams, above.
150. See, e.g. Teret, "Public Health and the Law", 76 AMER. J. PUB. HEALTH
1027, 1028 (1986), S. Baker et al, THE INJURY FACT BOOK (1984) 90-1,
Teret & Wintemute, "Handgun Injuries: The Epidemiologic Evidence for
Assessing Legal Responsibility", 6 HAMLINE L. REV. 341 (1983).
151. Compare Baker, "Without Guns Do People Kill People?", 75 AM. J. PUB.
HEALTH 587 (1985) (comparing U.S. and Danish murder) to International
Intentional Homicide Table, below.
152. Killias, "Gun Ownership and Violent Crime: The Swiss Experience in
International Perspective", a paper presented at the 1989 Annual
Meeting of the American Society of Criminology.
153. Kleck, "Capital Punishment, Gun Ownership and Homicide", 84 AM. J. SOC.
882 (1979) and Kleck, "The Relationship Between Gun Ownership Levels
and Rates of Violence in the United States" in D. Kates (ed.) FIREARMS
AND VIOLENCE (Cambridge, Ballinger: 1984).
154. Policy Lessons, above.
"Regardless of how "well parented" the shooters at Littleton were supposed to be, their parents should be brought up on charges of neglect and contributing to the delinquency of a minor"
You are a Fucking Idiot. Let's remove all responsibility from the individuals who pulled the trigger and place it on the parents. Let me tell you a true story:
When i was 8 i was sexually abused by an individual in a position of athority. the abuse lasted several years. during the abuse i would "black out" as a defense mechanism.
My parents noticed changes in my behavior and acted responsibly, contacted teachers, counselors, and therapists. My brain repressed all knowlege of the abuse. and even when I was directly questioned about sexual abuse I would deny it. Why? I still dont know. at the age of thirty I started having memories of the abuse.
I realize now that the abuse has had a major effect on my personality, personal relationships and substance abuse. In a different world I might have snapped and pulled the trigger.
Is this my parents Fault? I think not. they did everything in their control to prevent such a thing from happening.
There are a lot of external factors that affect who we are. No matter how protective our parents are eventually we have to leave the womb and face the world.
There are several reasons why someone can turn violent, and usually it is a combination of several things, which makes things even more complicated. Now if you watch you'll see different political people come foward and blame whatever helps their special interest (or special interest group) look better. Much like you will see normal people do the same thing to make it fit their views. Everyone does it, it's called rationalization.
But what makes someone truly violent, let me pose this point of view.
Being an outcast myself growing up I can identify with there motives, (And I'm sure several of can to although you will not admit it.) but I CANNOT identify with their actions. As long as you value human life, you will not be able to either.
So what happens that makes someone no longer respect life?
Well, think of this, in a vague statment for simplification. Depression, anger, and suicidal tought pattern. Now remember, to find a thief you must think like a thief, the same applies. If you do not value your life, you will not value the life of others (usually). The only thing that keeps you from killing yourself is hate. SO what would happen if you found a way to remove the object of your hatred and remove yourself from the equation.. viola.. April 20.
Now that was extremely vague, but hopefully insightful. But to explain it in detail would take forever.
Now the important thing to learn here is, unless you have any connection to anyone involved this should not effect you!! It will, but only because others will make it effect you.
People will impose restrictions, and pass legislation, to make people feel better, but THIS COULD NEVER HAVE BEEN PREVENTED. Anyone could walk up and start killing people anywhere regardless of what laws you pass and what items you ban, or restrict. Period.
Let me say it again. This is a sad story but it should not effect you. There are much more violent things that effect you now. Example: 1 in 4 women are reported beaten. This does effect you. You probably know several people who were (or are) beaten or raped, but no one screaming. Want to know why?
It's much easier to hate than to help.
Don't believe me. Look around and count how many people now look at people who wear black trench coats in contempt. Now how many are volinteering 4 hours a week to be a Big Brother/Sister, help with a youth program, or just spend time out of their day to help someone.
So we'll go about our business shocked and stunned, and maybe a bill will be passed to make us feel good. We'll treat the symptom but not the illness, and a few year we'll be shocked again.
The cure, I'll leave that up to you to decide.
I feel for the children who died or were injuryed, and for their friends and family, but I also feel sorry for the kids wearing black trench coats across the world and the hatred they will face.
People don't scare me, prejudice does, and get ready because it's coming.
-Killjoy
Everyone learns from their mistakes. Only a fool DOESN'T learn from their mistakes. It's a matter of learning the right lesson.
I live 10 doors down from an elementary school - last year a child stabbed another one with a knife, damn near killed the kid. When a friend of mine was attending University of Waterlook some guy took a shotgun to his girlfriend, both were students.
1)Students all over go wacko. People in general go wacko - student or not.
2)There is violence in Canadian schools, just not to the extent in the states.
mike
In Vancouver, Washington, e-mailed Enzo Falzon, high school students were pulled aside as they came through the front door and told they weren't allowed to wear trenchcoats. In a Philadelphia suburb, e-mailed Tim, (who asked that his last name remain anonymous), kids who play Doom were offered counseling. In Maine, e-mailed Vektor, who's 14, his parents made him open his private computer files so they could look through and make sure he wasn't doing anything "anti-social."
For some reason it took me several minutes to figure out where the verbs were in that sentence. I kept thinking the verb was "e-mailed" and couldn't figure out where the noun to that was.
Other than that, good observations, Mr. Katz.
(I hope this post won't disappear like the last one did...)
The gunmen told kids during the shooting that they were getting revenge for being mistreated. Just because they are killers and bad does not automatically make them liars--so quit jumping around the issue.
The cause is not guns, because they used bombs too. The cause is not bombs because they used guns too. The cause is not the internet becuase they listened to music and played video games also.
The cause is the way high school is designed. Adults feel high school has to remain the same throught history. i.e. the reason proms still exist and homecoming, etc. Another part of history is having the "nerdy" crowd, and the people who do not belong. Adults say "its just part of growing up". I say bullshit. It literally feels like hell when you are alone and see people all around you having fun but you can't--simply because you are part of this group of outsiders. No popular people talk to you because they fear someone else popular will see them and they will lose their status as popular. This is sick. Peer pressure causes more than drug habits, drinking, and sex. Its a failure of communication.
Another thing. Once you are at the point of suicidal _nothing_ matters. You do not care what you are doing at the moment, you do not care about people. High school causes suicide. People are NOT born to kill. People are NOT born to hate. People are NOT born to commit suicide. It is a learned behavior. People think they are worthless when no one talks to them and cares about them.
Those that blame guns are the football stars, the cheerleaders, the popular people. The only thing to blame is the schooling system in America. I'm just glad I survived. I've seen many more than 15 lives destroyed just during school. Every "goth" group, every "nerd" group, every "loner" is another loss. People think its hard living with a friend who died, a family member who died, etc. You don't know how hard it is to live with yourself after feeling worthless.
The historical evidence refutes the attribution of differential
international violence rates to differences in gun laws rather than
socio-institutional and cultural differences. Those who attribute low
European violence rates to banning guns are apparently unaware that those
low rates long preceded the gun bans.{139} In fact, stringent gun laws first
appeared in the U.S., not Europe -- despite which high American crime rates
persisted and grew.{140} Ever-growing violence in various American states
from the 1810s on, led them to pioneer ever more severe gun controls.{141}
But in Europe, where violence was falling, or was not even deemed an
important problem, gun controls varied from the lax to the non- existent.
During the 19th Century in England, for instance, crime fell from its high
in the late 18th Century to its idyllic early 20th Century low -- yet the
only gun control was that police could not carry guns.{142}
In considering reasons for the differentials between U.S. and British
homicide historically, Prof. Monckkonen rejects the conventional
explanations includiung gun ownership, remarking:
Virtually every analysis put forward to explain the [comparatively]
very high United States homicide rate has been ahistorical.... Had they
been proposed as historical, they would have foundered quickly for the
explanatory inadequacy of these "pet" theories becomes immediately
apparent in a historical context.{143}
When most European countries finally began enacting gun laws in the post-WWI
period, the motivation was not crime (with which those countries had been
little afflicted) but terrorism and the political violence from which they
have continued to suffer to the present day far more than the U.S. ever
has.{144} This difference is reflected in a practice that helps to keep
official English murder rates so admirably low: English statistics do not
include "political" murders, e.g. those by the IRA, whereas the American
statistics include every kind of murder and manslaughter.) The different
purposes of European versus American laws is evidenced by their
diametrically opposite patterns: many of the "Saturday Night Special" laws
American states enacted to deal with 19th Century crime banned all but
standard military- issue revolvers, i.e. the very expensive large, heavy
Colt. In stark contrast, such military caliber arms were the first guns
banned in post-WWI Europe, the purpose being to disarm restive former
soldiers and the para- military groups they formed.{145}
Moreover, if greater American gun relative availability were the cause of
international crime differences, the difference in crime would only be as to
crimes with guns. Yet American rates for robbery, rape and other violent
crimes committed without guns are enormously higher than the rates for such
crimes (with and without guns, combined) which are uniformly low among
Western European, British Commonwealth etc. countries regardless of whether
they allow or ban gun ownership. England's leading gun control analyst
sardonically disposes of the issues with two rhetorical questions: 1) How do
those who blame "lax American gun laws" for the far higher U.S. rate of gun
crime explain its also having far more knife crime: do they think that
Englishmen have to get a permit to own a butcher knife?; and 2) How do those
who attribute U.S. gun murders to greater gun availability explain the far
higher U.S. rate of stranglings and of victims being kicked to death: do
they think that Americans "have more hands and feet than" Britons? Flatly
asserting that, no matter how stringent the gun laws, there will always be
enough guns in any society to arm those desiring to obtain and use them
illegally, he attributes grossly higher American violence rates "not to the
availability of any particular class of weapon" but to socio-cultural and
institutional factors which dictate
that American criminals are more willing to use extreme violence[;
quoting a report of the British Office of Health Economics:] "One
reason often given for the high numbers of murders and manslaughters in
the United States is the easy availability of firearms.... But the
strong correlation with racial and linked socio-economic variables
suggests that the underlying determinants of the homicide rate relate
to particular cultural factors."{146}
REFERENCES:
139. See generally Gurr, "Historical Trends in Violent Crime: A Critical
Review of the Evidence", in 3 ANNUAL REVIEW OF CRIME AND JUSTICE
(Beverly Hills: Sage, 1981), C. Greenwood, FIREARMS CONTROL: A STUDY OF
ARMED CRIME AND FIREARMS CONTROL IN ENGLAND AND WALES ch. 1-3 (London:
Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1971), Morn, "Firearms Use and Police: An
Historic Evolution of American Values" in FIREARMS AND VIOLENCE above
at 496-501.
140. Morn, id., Kates, "Toward A History of Handgun Prohibition in the
United States" in RESTRICTING HANDGUNS above at 13-4.
141. For instance, in the South, the region of the United States which from
earliest times had the highest murder rates, gun law experimentation
included: the only state law that completely banned handgun sales
(S.C., 1902; repealed 1966); the earliest bans on "Saturday Night
Specials" (Tennessee, 1870; Arkansas, 1881; Alabama, 1893; Texas, 1907;
Virginia, 1925); the earliest registration laws (Mississippi, 1906;
Georgia, 1913; N.C., 1917); and three states in which a permit was
required to purchase a handgun (N.C. 1917; Missouri, 1919; Arkansas,
1923).
142. Greenwood, Morn, above.
143. Monckkonen, "Diverging Homicide Rates: England and the United States"
in T. Gurr, VIOLENCE IN AMERICA v. 1 at 81 (1989). He rejects gun
ownership as a reason for the homicide differential citing a point that
it made below in greater detail: even those who see guns as the reason
do not contend that their removal could reduce American homicide by
more than 50%; yet if American homicide were reduced by 50%, its rate
would still be 500% greater than the British rate.
144. Naturally, anti-gun academic crusaders do not credit the availability
of guns in the U.S. for its relative lack of political violence. They
(quite correctly) attribute that to socio-cultural and institutional
differences between the U.S. and Europe. Yet it does not occur to the
anti-gun academic crusaders to attribute international crime
differentials to socio-cultural and institutional differences rather
than differential gun ownership.
145. L. Kennett and J. L. Anderson, THE GUN IN AMERICA: THE ORIGINS OF A
NATIONAL DILEMMA 213 (Westport, Ct.: Greenwood, 1976), M. Josserand,
LES PISTOLETS, LES REVOLVERS ET LEURS MUNITIONS (Paris, Crepin-Leblond
& Cie, 1967) [in English transl., with co-authorship and additional
material by J. Stevenson, PISTOLS, REVOLVERS AND AMMUNITION (New York,
Bonanza, 1967)], ch. 9.
146. Greenwood & Magaddino, "Comparative Cross-Cultural Statistics" in
RESTRICTING HANDGUNS, above; see also Greenwood, above.
Does anyone remember the media coverage of the first of these incidents? There was a good deal of national press time dedicated to this "hot story." Each time another of these incidents occurs the media attention becomes greater. This can give disturbed kids some help directing their anger, at their teachers or peers. I am not a historian, but I suspect that since the media got greatly involved in these "kids that kill" stories and published them to death, the frequency of these incidents has dramatically increased.
Do you think we could have ever broken away from england without the use of guns? This country was formed from armed citizens. Adolf Hitler said the same thing about banning guns.
I'm quite proud that our citizenry has the right to keep and bear arms. I hope I don't offend by my next comment, that is not its intent.
.02
All too frequently I hear our European friends lambast America because her citizens have the right to keep and bear firearms. I must politely but firmly remind everyone that without America and her well armed and trained CITIZENS, England and France would have long ago traded their cultures for that of Germany (or Russia).
You see, it used to be that America's sons and daughters were brought up with guns and their RESPONSIBLE use. Without a military made up of people who knew how to effectively use firearms, WWII would have been lost.
I own, keep, and responsibly use several firearms myself. Unfortunately I must agree with many who say that there are too many people who have guns that shouldn't. Simply put, there are. No excuses. But, be they of criminal mind or not, I feel safer for myself and family that I can protect them.
My
Do you have any idea of how this nation was started?! Guess What?, it was started by our ancestors taking up arms against the government. The first step the government will take is to take away our right to bear arms...then we will only be able to defend ourselves with our mouth. Next comes our freedom of speech. etc, etc. Then we have lost our freedom all together!
We have taken God out of the classroom, and when I say this, I am NOT trying to force beliefs down your throat (which is a common argument). The breakdown of the family was next. We have kids born out of wedlock, parents getting divorced everyday. Where are the kids?, they are at school getting no moral influence in their lives. If you rebuild the family, you have rebuilt society. The family is the basic unit of society, lets get back to the basics.
Dont take my word for any of this, as I am only 16 years old and in the 11th grade.
Thanks,
x_draco@intrex.net
Uh sir, the last time I checked I AM responsible for any criminal acts committed by my minor children.
As for keeping guns locked at all times. A locked gun serves no purpose, including the primary reason why MOST people buy them -- personal protection. "Wait a minute Mr. Criminal, let me get my gun out of the safe and remove its lock while you attack my wife/child/me." Don't bet on it.
As for your final comment, even Thos. Jefferson wrote that armed revolutions were good, and maybe necessary for a society.
There are probably still small 'backyard' shops in Miami illegally turning out full-auto Mac-9s (9mm) and Mac-10s (.45) like they were in the 1980s. [It's actually easier to make (from scratch) a full-auto than a semi-auto - no 'stop after one shot' parts are needed.]
It is also remarkably easy (but not safe) to convert almost any semi-auto gun to full-auto by filing off various trigger-group bits inside it. It's not safe because a feeding problem can cause the point of one bullet to hit the primer of another, causing it to go off outside the barrel, this being a Bad Thing and injurous or deadly.
Doing this sort of thing is a felony, of course, unless you have a Class III Manufacturing Permit from the BATF and are making a full-auto weapon as a 'post-1986 Dealer Sample' or for a Certified Law Enforcement Agency or Department.
We are all quick to point the finger at something else...when we should take a look at the fact that we are all to blame. These kids were alienated because they were not accepted for who they were. We all judge people by their looks/music/etc... Even those who try to be fair in not being prejudice fail. I take more notice to the more attractive girls and the others kind of fall by the wayside. I don't mean it...but I do.
Over half the people who get shot (police officers included) get shot with their own weapons.
.22 pistol.
Anyone who thinks that just waving a weapon like a "magic wand" is going to scare people away is stupid. They are going to have their weapon taken away and used against them.
I come from a culture of guns in the hills of SE Ohio. Nearly every male kid I went to school with had at least a shotgun. I myself had a single shot 12 guage and a
The only time that you would see these weapons is if you went hunting with those people. No one waved weapons around to "threaten" others.
The first rule of weapon safety is that you _never_ point a weapon at anyone unless you intended to kill that person.
By the way, repeat after me,
This is my weapon,
this is my gun,
this one is for fighting,
this one is for fun.
A hand held weapon is never considered a "gun". A "gun" is used in the army and aboard naval ships in reference to large artillery peices, larger than mortars.
Anyone who is referring to the American problem with "guns" is an uniformed idiot. The press is included in this assessment.
> Finally, the vast majority of scientific research that's been done finds no significant value in gun control; indeed, there is considerable evidence to show that *higher* rates of gun ownership result in less crime.
Why is it that the US has fifteen times the number
of hand gun related murders per capita as Canada? Higher rates of gun ownership didn't seem to help
this statistic.
Every cowboy in Dodge had a gun but that didn't
seem to help the crime rate.
Now that's a happy
family life! In the burbs!
Kid wouldn't know a secure
home if it bit him.
From Rush's Subdivisions
"Sprawling on the fringes of the city
In geometric order
An insulated border
In between the bright lights
And the far unlit unknown
Growing up it all seems so one-sided
Opinions all provided
The future pre-decided
Detached and subdivided
In the mass production zone
Nowhere is the dreamer or the misfit so alone
Subdivisions --
In the high school halls
In the shopping malls
Conform or be cast out
Subdivisions --
In the basement bars
In the backs of cars
Be cool or be cast out
Any escape might help to smooth
The unattractive truth
But the suburbs have no charms to soothe
The restless dreams of youth
Some will sell their dreams for small desires
Or lose the race to rats
Get caught in ticking traps
And start to dream of somewhere
To relax their restless flight"
Somewhat apt
OK. Last I heard, the BATF said that there are about 200+ million guns in the good old US of A. From a different source, there are 60 to 70 million gun owners. That works out to about 1 in 4 people. That means that on average 1 in 4 of your aquaintances has a gun in his/her house! Alarming or illuminating? You decide. Yes, even ESR has them! Check out his web page! For 200 million guns - there should sensibly be more shooting! Yes, emotion rules when we hear news like what happened in Littleton, CO but do we let emotion rule or do we stop and think and consider? We've all seen the highly emotive parents scream and rant over pornography on the internet, we've all seen CDA/CDA II and we argue about it intellectually and with logic. Apply logic now. So what if the founders didn't even imagine what cyberspace could be like. Does that make their 1st Amendment out of date? Whose rights would you like to see abridged?
Mao, Mandela, Lenin, Washington, Guevara, Arafat, Ho Chi Minh knew!
Ultimately there is no more nice talking - you reach for whatever weapon is available and you take direct action. You complacent little slob, you have never been oppressed - sitting in your air-conditioned bedroom, scratching your arse! What do you know about death and deprivation. There are times when you fight injustice no matter the cost. The enemy will become demoralised and you will eventually prevail. Take to the hills, dig in, sabotage and blow-up and harry the enemy until they can no longer walk in the street without looking over their shoulder.
Thats how it become in the first world eventually because the of the edifices of control that are being build will eventually drive the controlled classes to utter powerlessness and then they will rise. It probably won't happen in our lifetimes but *EVERY* regime ends and generally in flames and great bloodshed. And atomic flames rage high, baby!
You can't hold someone accountable if they want to die.
The obsession with blame is ridiculous anyway. The mentality of the responsibility-freaks seems to be that once you've found somebody to blame, the problem is "solved". Well, that's idiotic. Tell the parents of the dead kids that it's okay now -- "Hey, we decided who to blame! You can stop grieving!" Crap.
If accurate blame-placement leads to prevention, that's great, and it's probably a good place to start. But there's no goal here. It's just aimless moralistic finger-pointing. They're not looking for a solution, they're looking for somebody to visit vengeance upon. And they're looking for one single clearly defined culprit, too. Anything as complex as reality is repugnant to these boneheads. It's just plain inconceivable that the same kids with the same upbringing might have reacted differently to different treatment by their peers. Bullshit. The gun nuts say that they only shoot people who threaten them. To me, that seems to imply an admission that the behavior of the people one shoots is relevant to the decision to shoot them. Of course, the victim's behavior may or may not actually justify the shooting, but even if it's not justified, you can't just wish away the likelihood that the guy who shot him may have had some kind of motivation, be it sane or otherwise.
Finally, all of these blame-placers are complaining about anybody (except of course themselves) people not accepting blame for anything. I guess if I deny responsibility for these events, then I'm guilty too, right? I mean, some people really aren't responsible. Face it. There are people on earth who did not cause these events. Some of them live in Colorado. Deal with it.
If I were to spill hot coffee on myself, I would not be suing over it. I would accept that it happened, and move on.
Well, if you had medical bills for burn treatment, and if you were old and on a fixed income, you'd certainly try to move on, ha ha. You might not move so fast, but I guess that's your own fault.
If she spilled the coffee, she should live with that.
If the coffee was hotter than she could reasonably expect, that's her fault? Of course it is; she was the one who was harmed. If I sell you an eggroll with broken glass in it, I'll be happy to let you take responsibility for that as well.
I'm not interested in arguing a single case as much as I am making a point.
And you're also not interested in whether your point is backed up by valid examples or not.
What really bothers me here is that in the name of "morality" and "personal responsibility", we've got able-bodied young men who think that if an old lady gets burned, that's her problem and she can go to hell. I am not impressed by that pseudo-Darwinian bullshit. Are we human beings or are we wild dogs? Hell, wild dogs care more about their neighbors than these knuckleheads. Unlike humans, most animals take care of each other (and, speaking of Darwin, they do it because it tends to help the pack survive). Maybe it's because they're not smart enough to tell themselves elaborate lies about how "self-sufficient" they are (after their parents have finished raising them, of course). Or maybe it's because they're not clever enough to drive themselves into extinction by short-circuiting the common sense gained in the course of evolving.
It's hard to believe that there were over 927 incidents in schools where 12 or more people were killed at all, let alone by methods other than guns.
When your ideological blinders hide the truth, it can be hard to see clearly. I sympathize. Nevertheless, these are facts. I could mention a few other facts, too, which ought to give you some more perspective on the so-called "danger" of firearms:
There's a lot that the media won't tell you. It is your duty to inform yourself. I'm just trying to help.
Since 54% were drive-by incidents, that means that a fair number of the school incidents were drive-bys
None of the school incidents were drive-bys. That should be obvious.
Is there someplace we can find these numbers?
I just provided them.
You just don't know it yet.
I read a report today that the guns were a double barrel shotgun, pump action shotgun, 9mm semi-automatic carbine, and a TEC-9 semi-automatic handgun. The two shotguns sawed off and cannot be considered a true hunting weapon. The article did not state what gauge the shotguns were (I'm guesing 12). Still, they were probably the most lethal guns that the kids had, especially at close range. A 9mm carbine would not necessarily be considered a high powered hunting rifle. And the TEC-9? Certainly you know the illustrious history of this gun which is no longer manufactured because of the Brady Bill. The TEC-9 is a "scary" looking handgun that is notoriously inaccurate.
If those kids really had used more lethal guns, the death toll would have been higher.
First of all I am tired of the States right to have armed militia as being misread to say that every nutcase is allowed to own an arsenal of weapons. No individuals were allowed to own cannons, for instance. Only towns were allowed to own cannons and even then they were kept locked in an armory.
Secondly, most families did in fact own a single musket. What isn't often said is the fact that this was shared between 20-30 related people who normally lived their entire lives in one area. Only in "wild west movies" does everyone pull out rifles and pistols to blaze away at each other.
Secondly, it is not laws and the punishments that the laws provide that keep most people from committing crimes, but just good common decency. The golden rule is in full effect in the world and this makes the world a beautiful place to live in.
The main problem is that too many people are being crammed together and this produces insanity as the fight or flight relex is over stimulated in susceptible individuals.
Eventually the person is no longer able to control themselves and the pressure becomes too great and unable to escape the stressors, they fight.
Tragically, senslessly. They pick up a gun or they use their cars and just start killing everyone in their paths.
We are still creatures of our glans and instinct. We are merely the rational animal, that is the animal that rationalizes all its acts to meet a preconcieved notion. If you need an explanation, think of normal people going insane and killing others as a form of population control similar to what the lemmings do.
Expect to see it more and more often in the future.
By far, the most powerful force in all children is to warn their parents/family when "something is wrong." And, like it or not, that is exactly what these kids were doing. Yes, they chose a wasteful and frightening method to express their warning, but nevertheless, we do them and ourselves a disservice when we dismiss them as "clueless."
It is not that young boys in this country are in terrifyiing crisis, which for sure they are. (They are dismissed by all forms of "mainstream" media (i.e. banker controlled media), and by their women and children who have turned to the state for their protection, as irrational, confused and violent. This is the sickening big lie. Boys (emerging into men) are not irrational, confused and violent. They deeply want to bring honor and security to their fathers, and mothers and siblings, but in return they want their mothers and their siblings to respect their fathers, and their future roles. Instead, women are now starting to reduce men to roving spermbanks and credit cards. Uh oh, we can't talk about men wanting to bring honor to women, or about women and children acknowledging, let alone respecting, the protection and comfort provided by their men.)
It is not that we as a nation have chosen violence as a normal and cost effective means to implement "the rule of law." The normal and expected relationship between the people and the state is now one of ultimate violence. (A black man in New York is welcomed by 47 bullets from three cops when he fails to *promptly* respond to their commands. (Cops regularly complain that race related "death during enforcement" situations result in 3 extra pages of paperwork. Kill a black man, and it's three extra pages of paperwork, they cry.) FBI commands the branch davidians at waco texas to come out, and then brings in military equipment to inject 20 lbs of CS2 and 10,500 lbs of F2 into a barn (7 tanks carrying 1,500 lbs of extra fuel oil each injected into the barn by standard fuel pumps on booms) when the wind is providing oxygen at 35-to-50 mph (tear gas is totally ineffective in a 35-50 mph wind.), and burns women and children alive with video cameras running (but at an acceptable distance). Serbian farmers get bombed off their land, because their leaders did or failed to do this or that. Have you been stopped for going 11 mph over the posted speed limit, and three cops are suddenly yelling at you with the three 45's aimed at your heart, etc. Thank god they control their rage. This is the normal relationship between the people, now trained by the media, and the state. Uh oh, can't talk about that either.)
What then is the issue? If we cannot talk about breakdown of the key role which men have in protecting in their family (your choices are strong family, or slavery of your women and children), and if we cannot talk about personal violence as the modus operandi for enforcement of "the rule of law," even if it results in 3-extra pages of paperwork when race related, then what's left.
The answer is the rebirth of Hitler (uh oh, we can't talk about that) and of slavery (uh oh, we can't talk about that either). I guess it must have been the violence from hollywood, huh Katz, or from those computer games, and the innate cluelessness and violence of young men.
If there is a possibility that this was not entirely random clueless violence by young men, then, Is there any possible warning which these kids may have given their lives to offer us (again not admitting to their chosen method). First, they chose the birthday of Hitler. What about that, Katz, might they not be trying to warn us about a terrifying rebirth of fascism? Let me assure you, young boys everywhere see the emerging rebirth of Hitler in today's media/banking and police-state apparatus, but when they try to warn us about it, they are dismissed.
These young men chose a wasteful, senseless, painful and counterproductive form of violence as their method, yes, but to me they may have also been trying to send a warning, about the rebirth of fascism and slavery, which we are all witnessing, and we are all afraid to talk about. Yes, the eleven? lives which they took, were important, even in comparison to the eleven lives which will be taken in each of the following weeks during the enforcement of rule of law by the state. But, if we ignore the warning which these children have designed, and if we dismiss their message as random noise from violence prone boys, then the lives which they took will pale in comparison to the loss of other lives which will take place as this trend continues.
The most powerful force in children is not to seek trinkets and toys, and to beat up on their parents. The most powerful force in children is to warn their parents and family, and then their community, when "something is wrong." Again, I do not condone their chosen method. But, there is the possibility that this was not the acts of totally random, totally thoughtless and totally violent boys.
As someone who had a family member in the school during the shooting, I think I can speak for everyone who had loved ones there who survived or otherwise:
Grow the fuck up. That's not funny.
As many people say they are a tool, and you cant blame actions on a tool, second. Since guns are not the only efficent weapon of death. i.e bombs that actualy where exentively used in this case. Bombs are illegal they are used any way due to there efficancy. Makeing something illegal doesnt make it go away, considering this was a illegal use of fire arms, bombs, ect its not important. In the united states our goverment was founded on the basis that if the goverment turned tyranical, it could be over thrown. The founders of the united states govement understanded this concept because they did just that. The people who should be prosecuited in this case are the people who gave access to thease weapons. Pretending it to go away doesnt actualy solve problems.
I agree. Who the hell plays Doom anymore? I haven't played Doom in years. Quake is even starting to get old and moldy these days. Shows what the average person knows about computers/games. I really don't think Doom could turn a 16 year old into a mass murderer. Doom might be slightly impressionable on someone younger.
Goat ownership is a civil right protected by the second amendment
to the Constitution of the United States. Why would you deny me my
civil liberties because of the actions of other spacegoats? Why not ban
inflammable sheep? or just arrest anyone who might utilize an ungulate?
If the mere availability of goats causes crime, why has the crime
rate dropped in Texas and Florida since their HGU (Home Goat Utilization)
laws went in to effect? Why are there no weekly massacres in
Kennesaw Georgia where every household is required to own a goat?
:)
the notion that parents have to be forced to educate their children is absurd.
You're thinking about this the same way that most Americans do, to wit: "I can do what I want with my dog or my car, so I can damn well do what I want with my kids!"
I've got a very un-American way of looking at it, but IMHO children are not possessions. They're people.
It's all well and good if the parents don't want their kids to learn to read, but is it really in the children's best interests? Will they really be thankful for this when they grow up unemployable, incapable of functioning in modern society? "Gee, thanks, dad, those principles of yours really helped me out!"
The idea that people should be forced to rotate their tires is indeed absurd, but I have no problem the idea that they should be prevented from denying their children an education.
in Rwanda, the weapon of choice was the machete.
And the victims had machetes, too.
> Kids being warned and counseled by fearful
> administrators and teachers ought to know that
> overall, teenage violence is way down in
> America, at its lowest levels since the
> Depression.
Hey john, interesting article. Missing a source mention/footnote for this particular (crucial) factoid, though.
Otherwise an interesting read.
-Omegaman (omega@fastband.com)
--no nick cause I'm not at my box at the moment
I know you are entitled to your opionion; however you should do a little research. There were privately owned war ships at the time our consitition was written as well as cannon. I know they were primative, but a muzzle loading cannon can cut down a lot of people with one shot.
The modern equivalence of these weapons would be nuclear arms. The point of the Second Amendment was that the people should not be outgunned by the government. If the government cannot trust its citizens with weapons, than how can the government be trusted with those weapons when it is made of the same people?
Benjamin Franklin said those that would trade liberty for safety deserve neither.
He also was asked after the Constitutional convention what kind of government they had created. He said a republic, if you can keep it.
I would like to keep my liberty and my republic. Right now both are under attack from within. If you don't like private citizens owning guns move to China.
I will make the assumption that you think it is a good thing that people are not allowed to own nuclear bombs. The reason people are not allowed to carry nuclear bombs is obvious: it is too easy to kill a whole lot of people.
At what point does it become too easy to kill people that we must ban a technology? Sure, I can kill a whole lot of people with a fork, however I probably won't be very successful with my rampage of fork terror because it is difficult to kill someone with a fork and I will likely be stopped before I kill many people or anyone at all. To the contrary, I can kill significantly more people with a gun before I am stopped, furthermore a gun is designed specificaly to kill people (as opposed to a fork which has other uses).
How many people must you be able to kill with a tool to justify banning it?
Hmm, I am what the law would considers a child. So acording to you i have no right to privacy? i mean, even if my parents were to go through my comp they wouldn't find anything objectionable, but maybe a few irc logs containing swearing. But if they were to go through, i would have absolutly no respect for them. about 2 years ago, my mom went through my room. before that i had lots of trust/repect for her. currently we do not have what one would call a trusting relationship alto it is slowly improving.
heh, this is starting to sound like a rant.
ah well, my point is that IMO "kids" have as much a "right" to privacy as "adults". by saying we do not have a right to privacy, well, its just plain insane. how would you like it if just on a whim the police showed up and went through all the files on your computer, turned your home inside and out?
pest
(i forgot my pw n don't wanna go get it)
> Fact is, the US murder rate is a lot higher than that of other western countries. People also have relatively easy access to guns. You figure it
>out.
Fact is, the US murder rate is a lot higher than that of other western countries. People also eat more beef. You figure it out.
It's the hormones in the meat, man!
After this!=Because of this. Any high school logic class will teach you that.
Anonymous Geek-grrl in training
Maybe your right, but who are flying these machines? And do you think that these pilots will carpet bomb their family and friends for almighty Uncle Sam? Most men and women in the service are their for education and jobs. Not to kill their fellow countrymen. It's not like it's that hard to steal a tank anyway. Remember the dumb ass in California?
Respect for Humanity?!
What has Humanity done to earn my respect?
Fucking NOTHING.
Humanity can eat the corn out of my shit for all I care.
Just some thoughts from a worthless A/C..
Everything I've read uptil now on this has missed the point. It's not about guns, media, games or whatever. The reasons why these 2 killed as they did are clearly stated by their associates but not recognised. While obviously not condoning their actions I sympathise with them.
It is often said 'violence does not solve problems'. In this society, violence *does* solve problems. It gets you respect on the sports field (many popular sports are no more than outlets for violence), and in interpersonal conflicts, and has been worshipped in the mass-media ever since western films or longer.
The murderers were geeks who were uncomfortable with their identity as males, were forced to mischannel their, not natural but gender-role-derived aggression, had no class or racial deprivation to blame for their miseries, and the friction of their internal conflicts eventually made them flare. This may seem like a simplistic assessment of the situation, but what more is there to be said? Unsociable white teenage males are an oppressed minority in society. Rather than help them the world consciously uses them like a footstool as negative role-models, the archetype of the non-profit-making loser, which no wholesome American boy should become.
When, occasionally one or two of them revolt against their mistreatment and kill a few people society at large is unaffected and reinforced in it's viewpoints. The media makes a song and dance about this, but no doubt they were expecting it. It's only unfortunate it came for them at a time when there was plenty more gratuitous violence for audiences to slaver over (ie. the bombing of yugoslavia). I'm not American but I suspect that killings such as these are just another ingredient of American culture. Perhaps the proliferation of neo-fascist and racist ideology in America is also linked to it's pervasive dog-eat-dog capitalism. Perhaps instead of turning to Hitler and racial superiority theories for an explanation for their shattered social lives, these guys would have embraced a more liberal, less murderous philosophy if they'd been living in a liberal, European country. The answer is for Americans at large to sit up and change their attitudes, but the likelihood of that happening is about nil.
Having said that, high-schools are much harsher places than the country in which they exist, so maybe I'm bashing America a little too hard. Still I think these general principles are true.
Banning guns would of course prevent this 'style' of massacre (although I believe guns and munitions shouldn't be banned because they simply ought not to be manufactured), they could have used knives, or improvised bombs instead (in fact I think they did). The answer is for people to become intelligent and educated and generally more civilised and tolerant, which I believe is happening especially through the Internet and the pacifying influence of things like Free Software..
This way, one-day, oppressed minorities simply will not exist. Until then we'll have massacres and there is absolutely nothing anybody can do to stop it. Defend freedom of speech and the Internet.. Keep your mind on the wider picture..
Pivacy is a fundamental human right. Do we remember what the fundamental rights are fundamental and unrevocable FOR? Becuase a society that does not respect the basic rights and responsibilities ends up destroying itself.
A person (remember, a PERSON, not an adult, not a child, not a 40 year white man with a good job, but a PERSON) ALWAYS has the right to privacy. I'll certainly bet (this is unprovable, so here comes opinion) that these two and other's in their social group had trouble with privacy in their youth.
Parents have responsibility over their children, not rights over them. Raising a child is not like raising a pet - you can't just hit it when it doesn't behave right and take away what you don't want it to play with. Children must be raised like people - if you want them to respect you, you must show yourself to be deserving of respect. If you want them to love you, you must show them love. They are not robots.
Growing up under the hateful eye of untrusting parents will not make for socially responsible youth. It will make for emotionally-nihilistic souls desperately trying to be in contanct with their own selves. It will lead to actions up to and including this most recent explosion.
Another thing, not on the subject of privacy/trust but closely related, is the definition of self. One can readily see from the distict social group and interests that the students cultivated that they were engaged in a full out war with their social and formal environment to define themselves as something other than their parents or as generic terms like "student."
We've all been there, and are always still on the road there(and if you haven't started down that road yet, I wish you good luck). But we get help - from friends, from parents, from the books we read and the movies we watch. People define themselves in terms of their separation from other things - I see no greater separation from the rest of the sometimes gelatinous mass of suburban highschool than a rejection of light and teamspiritedness.
These students were obviously being rolled over by the formal machine of their upbringing. Maybe they were for some reason weak in their ability to separate themselves while still being part of a group. Who knows. But I will tell you that this area is where we should be looking for causes.
Those are what I see as the possible causes of their state. But there are other things to be looked at in this story:
First, the obvious, why were they able to buy guns?
Second, their psychological state was obvious. Why did no one care? Why did no one help? I see many people, high school students and parents, crying for the lives lost, and asking "why" this happened. Did the corresponding students and parents and teachers, the people, in and around columbine high school ever speak to these people? Express any sort of human emotion to them? Would these people who now are tearfully signing their names to pointless chain e-mails even have given a second glance to the dark, seperate group? No.
This has gotten to be a very long message. I hope what I am trying to say about growth, trust and identity got through. Remember, love and emotion are not magically bestowed upon people. They must be learned.
-- Big Jim.
|
I have an account, but I'm posting this anonymously.
It's really frustrating the way the media is pointing to the 'net, videogames, etc. and not recognizing the fact that today's generation of teenagers is the most emotionally f***ed up generation this country has ever seen.
I think most people would be shocked at the huge number of high
When you're wondering just what the fuck is wrong with this country, Michael Moore usually has an answer.
I have an account, but I'm posting this anonymously.
It's really frustrating the way the media is pointing to the 'net, videogames, etc. and not recognizing the fact that today's generation of teenagers is the most emotionally f***ed up generation this country has ever seen.
I think most people would be shocked at the huge number of high schoolers who have depression, anxiety attacks, and similar problems. I graduated high school in 1996, and in the past few years, I have been amazed at how many people I knew were depressed for years, while I had no idea. I was depressed, and they had no idea.
The question that comes into my mind when tragedies like these occur is not "Why does this stuff happen?" but "Why doesn't this stuff happen more often?" Thank God that it doesn't, but, like many depressed people, I was very violent towards myself in high school. I was always lying to people to explain the numerous cuts on my arms and wrists. I never even considered hurting others, but how far of a step is it from being violent to yourslef and being violent towards others. And I was one of the lucky ones. I wasn't treated horribly by my classmates. I had very loving parents. I had a very close friend (girlfriend at the time) who pretty much forced me into counseling. What about the people who aren't so lucky? Thank God that there isn't more violence.
Parents who "keep tabs" on their kids deserve to die the
most horrific death. Intrusion of privacy is the worst
crime a parent can commit with respect to a child, short
of sexual abuse. I would advise parents to not get into
their kids' lives. Pay attention but do not stick your nose
where it hurts the kid, else you may have your brains
busted out.
The reason for these shootings is clear as day and I am
surprised all these psychologists didn't yet figure it out.
These kids are ostracised by their peers. Revenge is the
motive. Inner city kids usually join a gang when they need
to belong. Middle class suburbia doesn't offer this way out,
hence the geographic pattern.
I think that in recent years kids (especially after the age of
12-14) began to recognize more and more that they are full
human beings, not to be overseen or told what to do. This
is a historical pendulum: years ago 13 was the age for becoming
adult, then it got extended to 18, now the pendulum is swinging
back while kids (adults actually) try to assert their rights. They
are finally realizing that they can do as much as legal adults
and they are taking advantage of it. I have no clue how to swing this
pendulum back but I have a feeling that like most such things it'll
reach a turning point by itself and start declining eventually.
Judging by previous pattern, the time scale is a few decades.
Lastly, let me express the deep rooted feeling that the recent shootings
are a very good thing. The people at those schools should be scarred
for life, because they are the root of this evil. They are the ones who
drove those poor rebels to shoot. This should hopefully teach them a lesson
that you can only torture a person so much. Ideally, all America would
realize that ostracising people is a bad thing, worse even than the
logical result of it: school shootings. BTW, given how evil current
high school social dynamics is, I am surprised noone has yet replicated
Oklahoma city in their suburb. Wouldn't it be a fitting end, to kill ALL
those who tortured you, at once and for sure.
Look at canada. Our crime rate overall is 1/3 of what it is in the us. Our societies are also almost the same. We have gun control, and our country is safer. There are other factors that contribute to this, but gun control is obviously a major one.
other dynamic factors would include:
-smaller urban centers (although still large -- Toronto has 6~ million people)
-we have better social programs
static factors:
-our unemployment rate is 8%, which means that the US most likely has less poor people (I blame this on stupid govt policy that saves to lower the deficit when they should be increasing spending since inflation is low)
Dennis J Potechin -- djp@braveheart.net
I didn't read many comments on here, it just happened to be one I did read.
The media always struck me as being very callus about these situations. I had no idea how inappropriate the media and a significant, if small, portion of the population can be until I found my family involved.
The victims and the aggressor were not children in this case. The same sort of thing happened in the UK a couple of years ago, but the aggressor was not a child either. Also compare Canadian crime rates per capita as a whole and in any urban centre and you will find them far lower than in the US.
Well at least they and the media don't cause 99.999% of teh population to kill, BUT what about desensitization and loss of empathy. I think this would be an interesting research inquiry. I'm not sure how it would be conducted, but I would be curious to know the empathy and sensitivity levels to violence of people who don't play video games at all, play 5 hrs/week, 10 hr/week, 20 hrs/week, +20hrs/week. THIS would be an interesting survey and I doubt anyone here can claim with certainty that the media and video games DON'T cause the aforementioned traits.
No way there were 927 incidents in schools where 12 or more people were killed. Why? Because this Colorado incident was the largest. 15 people died. So you're saying there were 926 other incidents where > 12 && = 15 people died at a time from stabbings alone. Bullshit. Can I have a source please? You merely stating that they are facts does not validate anything.
---->Obvious reasonsIsn't the definition of middle class something like "really good at hiding their flaws"? While it may or may not be true that these kids had a perfect family life, I think it's a little naive of you to decide on the basis of a two paragraph blurb that these two had an idyllic family life. And even more naive to suggest (implicitly) that just because they had a good family that there was nothing else wrong in their lives. Even if they had a PLEASANT family life, that will not prepare them to meet the slings and arrows of reality. Just because you don't abuse your children or ignore them doesn't make you a good parent, you need to teach self-reliance, responsibility and appropriate ways of dealing with your feelings if you are planning on raising human beings rather than well-dressed gorillas.
(Yeah, I know, a bit preachy, but I thought it needed saying.)
Anonymous Geek-Grrl in training
cars are involved in WAY more deaths than guns ;)
The authors are Daniel D. Polsby is Kirkland & Ellis Professor of Law at
Northwestern University School of Law in Chicago. Dennis Brennen is
professor of economics at Harper College in Palatine, Illinois.
The whole document is available at:
http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/guns/aiming.html
Myth No. 1: Guns cause crime. A review of the academic literature shows
that there is no relationship between the number of guns and the amount of
crime in the United States. Criminologists Gary Kleck and E. Britt
Patterson reported in 1993 their finding that gun ownership had no
significant effect on the rates of murder, assault, robbery, or rape in
the U.S. Between 1973 and 1992, the rate of gun ownership in the U.S.
increased by 45 percent (from 610 guns per 1,000 people to 887). The
homicide rate during that period fell by nearly 10 percent (from 9.4
homicides per 100,000 people to 8.5).
Myth No. 2: Gun control laws reduce crime. Firearms have been regulated
with increasing stringency in the United States for most of the past
thirty years. Nevertheless, the number of firearms in private hands has
increased continuously by many millions per year; handguns have become an
increasing proportion of privately owned firearms; and rates of crime,
violent crime, and homicide have shown no relationship to the passage or
enforcement of gun laws. In their 1993 research, Kleck and Patterson
analyze the impact of 19 gun control measures on six categories of
violence. In ninety of the resulting 102 relationships, they found no
significant correlation between gun laws and violence.
Myth No. 4: Gun control laws keep criminals from obtaining guns. In
surveys of prisoners, a majority report that they had owned a handgun
prior to their imprisonment. But only 7 percent of criminals' handguns are
obtained from legitimate retail sources. Three-fourths of felons surveyed
report they would have no trouble obtaining a gun when they were released,
despite legal prohibitions against firearms ownership by convicted felons.
Are you an idiot? "Evil" is just the unintelligent way to describe an abstract idea. It dates back to a time when people believed that "the devil made me do it" and hundreds of years before that, in pagan times, they believed that it was the cruel gods that were making people do the evil things that they did.
However, if you were really trying to say that this is an issue of nature versus nurture, then you are partially correct. Some people are born with psychological problems/chemical imbalances (whatever they choose to call it nowadays). The simple truth, though, is that this was not one kid doing this. This statistically rules out the nature issue. The truth is that this was caused by a number of diminutive factors that in the end caused them to deviate from social norms.
The authors are Daniel D. Polsby is Kirkland & Ellis Professor of Law at
Northwestern University School of Law in Chicago. Dennis Brennen is
professor of economics at Harper College in Palatine, Illinois.
It is availabe at: http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/guns/aiming.html
Myth No. 1: Guns cause crime. A review of the academic literature shows
that there is no relationship between the number of guns and the amount of
crime in the United States. Criminologists Gary Kleck and E. Britt
Patterson reported in 1993 their finding that gun ownership had no
significant effect on the rates of murder, assault, robbery, or rape in
the U.S. Between 1973 and 1992, the rate of gun ownership in the U.S.
increased by 45 percent (from 610 guns per 1,000 people to 887). The
homicide rate during that period fell by nearly 10 percent (from 9.4
homicides per 100,000 people to 8.5).
Myth No. 2: Gun control laws reduce crime. Firearms have been regulated
with increasing stringency in the United States for most of the past
thirty years. Nevertheless, the number of firearms in private hands has
increased continuously by many millions per year; handguns have become an
increasing proportion of privately owned firearms; and rates of crime,
violent crime, and homicide have shown no relationship to the passage or
enforcement of gun laws. In their 1993 research, Kleck and Patterson
analyze the impact of 19 gun control measures on six categories of
violence. In ninety of the resulting 102 relationships, they found no
significant correlation between gun laws and violence.
Myth No. 4: Gun control laws keep criminals from obtaining guns. In
surveys of prisoners, a majority report that they had owned a handgun
prior to their imprisonment. But only 7 percent of criminals' handguns are
obtained from legitimate retail sources. Three-fourths of felons surveyed
report they would have no trouble obtaining a gun when they were released,
despite legal prohibitions against firearms ownership by convicted felons.
Myth No. 6: Guns don't work as self-protection against criminals. In fact,
guns are about as valuable to civilians as they are to police officers,
and for the same reason. According to criminologists Gary Kleck and Marc
Gertz, every year adults use guns for protective purposes 2.5 million
times. As many as 65 lives are protected by guns for every life lost to a
gun. Each year, potential victims kill between 2,000 and 3,000 criminals;
they wound an additional 9,000 to 17,000. Moreover, mishaps are rare.
Private citizens mistakenly kill innocent people only thirty times a year,
compared with about 330 mistaken killings by police. Criminals succeed in
taking a gun away from an armed victim less than 1 percent of the time.
The real utility of defensive firearms, moreover, must surely be far
greater, and would be measured not by how many people were shot or even
how often a gun was fired, but rather by the deterrent effects of a
civilian being armed.
Myth No. 7: Guns aren't needed as self-protection. About 83 percent of the
population will be victims of violent crime at some point in their lives,
and in any given year serious crime touches 25 percent of all households.
The odds are not likely to improve; there is only one police officer on
patrol for every 3,300 people. And the courts repeatedly have ruled that
government has at most a limited duty to protect individual citizens from
crime. An illustrative case is Warren v. District of Columbia, in which
three rape victims sued the city under the following facts: Two of the
victims were upstairs when they heard the other being attacked by men who
had broken in downstairs. From an upstairs telephone, the two roommates
made several calls to the police. Half an hour passed and their roommate's
screams ceased; they assumed the police must have arrived. In fact,
however, their calls had been lost in the shuffle while the roommate was
being beaten into silent acquiescence. When her roommates went downstairs
to see to her, as the court's opinion describes it, "For the next fourteen
hours the women were held captive, raped, robbed, beaten, forced to commit
sexual acts upon each other, and made to submit to the sexual demands" of
their attackers.
Having set out these facts, the District of Columbia's highest court
nevertheless exonerated the District and its police, noting that it is a
fundamental principle of American law that a government and its agents are
under no general duty to provide public services, such as police
protection, to any individual citizen.
Myth No. 8: Gun control laws are especially needed to prevent the purchase
of Saturday Night Specials and "assault weapons." Inexpensive handguns are
involved in only 1 to 3 percent of violent crimes; criminals generally
prefer larger caliber and more expensive handguns. Moreover, in the past
fifty years no civilian has ever used a legally owned machine gun in a
violent crime. And despite their repeated use by drug dealers on
television and movies, no Uzi has ever been used to kill a police officer
in the United States. Even some gun control advocates concede that
so-called assault weapons play a minor role in violent crime. In 1991,
1992, and 1993 combined, there were more than 2,500 criminal homicides in
the City of Chicago--only three of which were perpetrated with a true,
military-style, "assault weapon."
Myth No. 9: Gun control laws are especially needed to prevent gun
accidents in the home. "Gun-control advocates have sought to create the
impression that firearm accidents involving children are a large and
growing problem," writes the Independence Institute's David Kopel. "Many
people mistakenly conclude that children die frequently in gun accidents
and that sharp restrictions on gun ownership are necessary to address the
problem." In fact, however, the number of gun accidents involving both
children and adults has fallen dramatically.
In 1970, 2,406 Americans died from firearms accidents. By 1991, that
number had fallen to 1,441--even as the number of guns increased
dramatically. Between 1970 and 1991, the annual rate of fatal gun
accidents was cut in half, from 1.2 to 0.6 per 100,000 Americans. The
death rate from firearms accidents is lower than that from accidental
drowning (1.6 per 100,000 in 1991), inhalation and ingestion of foreign
objects (1.3), and complications from medical procedures (1.0).
If you are gung-ho for gun control, I suggest you live up to your convictions by posting a big sign on your front lawn that reads:
THIS HOME IS A GUN-FREE ZONE
I wish you joy of all the delightful visitors you will attract.
No? Sound like a bad idea to you? Then perhaps you should consider how dependent you are on the kindness of ``gun nuts'' and rethink your position...
People are smart in different ways. The simple truth is that it is ingrained in the minds of this American society. In the end, you can only accomodate human nature, not control it. However, there is such as thing as social evolution. A group of individuals doing their thing doesn't make a society. A group of individuals working together for the well-being of ALL its members is.
This isn't really a gun control, or societal violence issue at all. It's a BIRTH CONTROL issue. If you're not going to spend time with your child, and raise it to be honest, fair, loving, kind, and -fearing. Then you need to cut back on your incessant habit of FUCKING you idiots.
If you have a child, and you're not COMPLETELY in touch with where they are, what they are doing, or how they are behaving, then you are a complete fucking failure as a parent, and if you had one iota of intelligence, you' be whacking yourself for raising scum like this.
Screwing is a great benefit for one of the worlds toughest jobs.
If you don't trust your governement then VOTE ! I hate those silly bast* that whine all the time about how the governement has decided to screw them but at the same time haven't a clue about what politics is.
Sure it is easier to point and shoot that use your brain and talk, organise public demonstrations and strikes. I guess that's what the founding fathers thought : "those American are so stupid, they'll never manage to organise a democracy and make it live, we'd better let them do politics with guns, it will be easier for their small brain".
"Violence is the argument of the weak" (don't remember who said that) . That means that guns are for mentally deficient people that haven't a clue about what an election is.
So, should your parents be paying attention to
the stuff you are posting ?
"The only way to reduce the number of people they actually kill is to take away the means of mass slaughter - ie guns."
Unfortunately, to buy that statement, you would have to overlook the fact that the guns the kids were using were illegal anyway. (One used a sawed-off shotgun which was not legal anywhere.) I'm not a die-hard NRA gun-toter, but getting rid of guns won't do it. Something else is afoot here. You can easily point to nations like Switzerland as an example of how guns can exist in the general society without mayhem erupting (just as easily as you can point to Japan as an example of a safe nation with gun control).
It has nothing to do with games/movies/tv. It is because the students in school today are so crule they DESERVE to die! .. At least in the minds of those who do this.
You may whine about the innocent, but the fact is that there are very few innocent, and even then.. You are putting them out of their misery. These people deserve it, plain and simple..
We need to give our students an escape.. These problems are the american version of Japan's super-high student suicide rate. The students are under a lot of pressure to do well in school, while at the same time being in an increadibly emotinally abusive enviroment, and to top it off many parents and most teachers are NOT at all helpful ( or at least the students do not believe them to be ).
About four years ago, an acquatance (then high school sophmore) brought a revolver to school. For months several members of the school christian group were emotially abusing him in many digusting ways. The school administration looked away (after all, why would they want to suspend their star football player), and his parents would only say "what did you do to cause this? are you GAY or something?". He tried to press charges, but after talking to the school and his parents, the poliece decided they couldn't do anything. His parents wouldn't let him drop out. He stole a gun from next door and brought it to school not sure if he should shoot them, himself, or both. He saw no other escape. In the morning before school, a group came out to taunt him: He reached into his bag to pull out the gun, and it accidently went off. No one was hurt. The school swept it under the rug and no charges were filed. He dropped out and moved to another county. He's now doing well at a university in another state.
How many adults today rember how helpless you felt when you were under the age of 18? As adults there are few problems that you can't walk away from if you prepair (having savings and such). Students like this are powerless without these extreme acts.
I never ceases to amaze me when people explain a lack of discipline by suggesting that parents undermine their God-given place as the parents, NOT as the friend of their kids. This relationship has survived millennia for a very simple reason: it works. For a child to grow up to be a functional, productive member of society, (s)he must learn to live within the rules/laws agreed upon by the society they wish to join. If a kid doesn't feel like he has a clearly defined position within a social structure, then he will not know how his actions relate to his placement in that structure relative to where he wants to go. This begins with the dichotomous existence[sic] of a kid growing up in a household where he gets treated one minute as a friend (when talking about sex, etc.) and the next minute as a child (punishment for bad behaviour). This is especially aggravated by situations such as mothers that choose to stay in the same house as the father that abuses them and/or the kids, single-parent households (ya gotta have balance, people) and gay-parent households (ugh).
:)
Here's something for your perusal...
When Pastor Joe Wright was asked to open the new session of the Kansas Senate, everyone was expecting the usual politically correct
generalities. But, what they heard instead was a stirring prayer, passionately calling our country to repentance and righteousness. The response was immediate; a number of legislators walked out during the prayer. In six short weeks, Central Christian Church logged more than 5,000 phone calls, with only 47 of those calls responding
negatively. Commentator Paul Harvey aired the prayer on the radio and received a larger response to this program than any other program
he has ever aired. Central Christian Church is now receiving international requests for copies of this prayer from India, Africa and Korea. Pastor Joe's prayer is reprinted here as an encouragement and challenge for each of us to stand for the truth of the Gospel whenever the Lord gives us the opportunity.
"Heavenly Father, we come before You today to ask Your forgiveness and seek Your direction and guidance. We know Your Word says, 'Woe on those who call evil good,' but that's exactly what we have done.
We have lost our spiritual equilibrium and inverted our values. We confess that:
We have ridiculed the absolute truth of Your Word and called it pluralism.
We have worshipped other gods and called it multiculturalism.
We have endorsed perversion and called it an alternative lifestyle.
We have exploited the poor and called it the lottery.
We have neglected the needy and called it self-preservation.
We have rewarded laziness and called it welfare.
We have killed our unborn and called it choice.
We have shot abortionists and called it justifiable.
We have neglected to discipline our children and called it building self-esteem.
We have abused power and called it political savvy.
We have coveted our neighbor's possessions and called it ambition.
We have polluted the air with profanity and pornography and called it freedom of expression.
We have ridiculed the time-honored values of our forefathers and called it enlightenment.
Search us, O God, and know our hearts today; cleanse us from every sin and set us free. Guide and bless these men and women who have been sent here by the people of Kansas, and who have been ordained by You to govern this great state. Grant them the wisdom to rule, and may their decisions direct us to the center of Your will.
I ask it in the name of Your Son, the Living Savior, Jesus Christ, Amen."
So how ya like that? I just know it peeves you fence-sitters out there.
Actually, one of the movies (based on the book), was called "Mazes and Monsters", or something like that. The main theme of it was about a kid who was so wrapped up in a "D&D"-like game that he thought that he was "in" the game or something - very bizarre to say the least. I am sure that there was at least one other TV movie like it, and maybe even a few books - but the above one is the only one I know of...
Gun controls can work. However, they are only a diminutive factor. It is not only the ease in which someone can gain a gun, it is the "eye for an eye" mentality in which "if someone punches you, you punch them back". More civilized countries such as Canada (present Canada. I don't want to hear any bs about the atrocious acts we committed 50 years ago) teach values wherein you walk away from a fight. That is why our crime rate (especially violent crime) is far lower.
Gun control and an active education program wherein ANY type of violence is not acceptable -- even when someone is violating one of those paramount rights in the constitution -- will lower the threshold for these violent crimes even being conceived.
In this case though, as should by the bomb making, these kids were VERY sick. They spent weeks building these bombs and contemplating when they would attack. In most cases though, people are not thinking and will just grab an easily obtained weapon and attack. This is why gun control can work.
I am a violently-minded person, and I have been diagnosed by a doctor as suffering from mental illnesses. I am taking prescribed drugs to control my mood swings.
Why am I confessing this to the world? Only so you know that I am speaking from experience and not merely speculating when I tell you this:
Violent video games and movies can do a great deal to make people less violent. They have helped me calm down a lot, at least as much as these pills I've been popping. Playing ultra-graphically violent action-packed games on my computer, or spending an hour at the video arcade, or watching any of my favorite violent movies can do wonders at calming me down when I feel I am near the edge of my self-discipline.
I am not saying that my experience is necessarily representative of the majority's, but it is one data point, and I can tell you that I have heard other people say the same thing about themselves. At the very least, it should be looked at more closely -- what if we succeeded in eliminating violent games and movies from our society, and sufferend a huge backlash because people were no longer getting the outlet they needed for their violent moods?
I agree completely! I think that doing what you do is how I survived.
:)
KMFDM rules!
None of the guns used in this terrorist act were stolen from parents. The most deadly weapon that was used was not the semi-auto rifle or pistol, but the bombs, and sawed off pump shotgun; incidently it IS illegal to possess either without a federal liscense.
As to saving 3,4 or even 5 lives, is that worth the 600,000 to 2,000,000 crimes in this country that are PREVENTED by guns?
If we want to save the most number of children by banning something that is non-essential in this country, we should ban swimming pools. there are less than a half million yet more children die in them than due to gun violence (not counting suicides)
Guns are not just designed just to kill. They do have other uses. Heck they are even used in Olympic competition. Guns are also the great equalizer. Without them the weak are easily oppressed by the strong.
I thought that it was poisoned Kool-Aid(>800)
Actually I think that Marilyn Manson is a moralist.
:)
And he actually lost his face in Scandinavia, where he thought mooning would be a umn wild thing. Audience here just laughed.
Yeah, so lets give everybody a nuclear bomb, so that the world will be an even safer place, according to your logic.
What you say is stupid. Guns are designed for killing. there more guns, the more capacity of killing. I don't see how this can decrease the number of crime (and I don't even mention ALL other western countries that ban guns and have a much lower crime rate, which completely contradicts what you say).
WOW! You've spoken my live! I walked that path, but insted of killing people, I left.. My parents kicked me out for dropping out of school, and I lived on the streets for nearly a year. But I pushed thorugh and made it.. No one dead in the progress.. :) But I must be a rare case.. Most kids can't just leave their homes and famlies.. Perhaps because my parents were acholics and were never there for me anyways it was easier. I dont know..
In the initial post, I claimed that 822 of 1,523 killings were drive-by's, and 927 were in schools. In the post to which you responded, I claimed that none of the school killings were drive-by's. Do the math. If at least 927 were not drive-by's, and 822 were, then those two mutually exclusive categories add up to 822 + 927 == 1749 killings, out of a total of 1523. In retrospect, I should have broken the numbers more outrageously than that.
Not only that, but for God's sake I was claiming that there were drive-by knifings in which twelve or more people were killed! Maybe with a large sword, just maybe -- but even then you'd have to find a crowded bus stop and make several passes, in the course of which you'd probably have to drive up onto the sidewalk to follow the fleeing victims. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense when you think about it. It's hard to kill twelve or more people. They don't die that easily. These morons in Colorado had an arsenal, they were in close quarters with panicked victims in crowded rooms, and they only killed thirteen people (other than themselves, of course).
Why did I post that crap? I'm just sickened by the gun nuts making political capital out of the grief of these families, and I responded with satire.
You're telling it how it is.. Too bad more people don't see it this way.
The problem is not that guns=crime, but guns are a part of the picture itself. Banning guns won't suppress crime, but it will still have a decreasing effect on it.
Most people want to find THE problem and solve it. But with crime there are several different things that makes up the problem, and if we don't address all of them at the same time it won't change. People who advocate guns buy saying that it won't stop crime are right, but it will still reduce crime, statistically speaking.
How often do criminals invade people's houses?...I'm sure it happens occasionally, but certainly a lot less often
Please enlighten us more with your baseless, factless opinions.
Further, if you are stupid enough to keep your gun where it accessible to your kids, you shouldn't have had kids in the first place.
And now for some facts
Myth No. 6: Guns don't work as self-protection against criminals. In fact, guns are about as valuable to civilians as they are to police officers, and for the same reason. According to criminologists Gary Kleck and Marc Gertz, every year adults use guns for protective purposes 2.5 million times. As many as 65 lives are protected by guns for every life lost to a gun. Each year, potential victims kill between 2,000 and 3,000 criminals; they wound an additional 9,000 to 17,000. Moreover, mishaps are rare. Private citizens mistakenly kill innocent people only thirty times a year, compared with about 330 mistaken killings by police. Criminals succeed in taking a gun away from an armed victim less than 1 percent of the time. The real utility of defensive firearms, moreover, must surely be far greater, and would be measured not by how many people were shot or even how often a gun was fired, but rather by the deterrent effects of a civilian being armed.
Myth No. 9: Gun control laws are especially needed to prevent gun accidents in the home. "Gun-control advocates have sought to create the impression that firearm accidents involving children are a large and growing problem," writes the Independence Institute's David Kopel. "Many people mistakenly conclude that children die frequently in gun accidents and that sharp restrictions on gun ownership are necessary to address the problem." In fact, however, the number of gun accidents involving both children and adults has fallen dramatically.
In 1970, 2,406 Americans died from firearms accidents. By 1991, that number had fallen to 1,441--even as the number of guns increased dramatically. Between 1970 and 1991, the annual rate of fatal gun accidents was cut in half, from 1.2 to 0.6 per 100,000 Americans. The death rate from firearms accidents is lower than that from accidental drowning (1.6 per 100,000 in 1991), inhalation and ingestion of foreign objects (1.3), and complications from medical procedures (1.0).
I am a grown up who happens to have strong memories.
If I were underage and still living with my parents then the
answer would be: absolutely not. Indeed, my parents didn't
intrude on me and I didn't do any harm to anyone. In fact,
had they gone Nazi on me, I might have snapped.
The only thing stopping the government from rounding us up and getting rid of "undesirables" is the fact that there ARE so many guns in the US.
Nonsense. Absolute goddamn nonsense. The U.S. government is responsible to the people of the U.S., that's why they don't do those things. When on rare occasions they do fuck something up (e.g. Waco, the white-supremacist machine-gun-salesmen on Ruby Ridge), they come in for an incredible amount of criticism. The Freemen thing in Montana was peaceful, wasn't it? They were walking on eggs there trying to avoid violence. These people are American citizens just like you and me, they are not mysterious, magical symbols of evil. They are human and they are responsive to public opinion.
You believe that the government is an evil creature imposed from outside somehow. Well, that's just your way of creating a scapegoat to blame for all your fears and problems. See a shrink instead, it'll help a lot more.
In any case, it would have been no more a crime to shoot Randy Weaver than to shoot Charles Manson, or to shoot one of these two morons who ran amok in Colorado this week. Exterminating vermin is a community service.
I certantly felt that way in school.. How close I came..
I wasn't looking at it as a single causation. I was looking at it as a diminutive factor. Gun control won't stop people from getting guns. However, the "eye for an eye" that comes with everybody arming themselves will. There were probably twenty equally major factors that caused these kids to do this. Gun controls will, however, stop other emotionally motivated crimes in which the killer acted before they had a chance to think -- and easily obtained guns allows for this. It's simple math. Systematically eliminating all those factors that cause any type of violent crime is a good thing. I'm not saying that it is possible to eradicate these problems, but it is possible to limit them.
I am an american who has lived in Canada for 5 years and have got used to their ways. I've read some of the comments on slashdot and am abhorred that people want to have any kind of violent weapon.
The nuclear weapon comparison is a good example. Everyone has them because everyone else does, and will possibly use them. Does it make sense? no. You're under-estimating the possibilites of social evolution.
Yeah, right. Murphy (c) is a good Swiss name.
This is one of the best posts here.. Why can't the media figure this out?
I know that the ridicule I recieve made me upset enough to kill (perhaps myself or someone else)..
Yes, putting a weapon with the ability to eliminate life into everyones hand is really smart.
Hopefully not. I wouldn't like to have universe throwing all the bad things, that I've done, at me.
No. Karma can't work.
But all the other people can throw the bad things that you've done unto them back at you. And probably will, if they are human enough.
You need to send this to CNN. You took my breath away!
Crime is up 30% in Australia since total gun control went into effect. That's something the media won't tell you.
That's right, killfile Jon Katz, he can't please everyone so that disqualifies him as Jesus Christ so killfile him. Better that we killfile Katz than accept the fact that he can't always say what *you* want to hear.
Now go on and close your mind, it's much safer for you that way. Take the bluepill and read only happythings[tm].
strong words - so prove your statistic!
Does that mean that all countries where guns are illegal are under dictature ? I doubt it ! People who stick to this idea of "guns for democracy" should have their head checked : they are paranoid. Stop watching X-files and learn a little about politics.
you couldn't have said it better.
People are responsible for their own choices.
Your enviroment can influence your decision, but the final decision is up to you.
Funny, I bet the British said the same thing in the 18th century... right before a band of poorly equipped rebels kicked their collective arses back where they came from.
:P
Hehe. I bet some wise colonels said something like that in Vietnam, during the war. Those VietKongs barely have the artillery power/air support we have.
Jerk!
Humm, I think John Major is no longer prime minister of England. You should get an education first before speaking of what you don't know.
The problem is that there is NO statistics to prove such things. Statistics are good for finding one problem, two problem... but when the problem is made up of a dozen different sub problems, statistics are useless because too many variables come in the way. That's why nobody has ever proved that guns encourage or discourage crime. It's part of the problem (even pro-guns admit that), but nobody will ever be able to come up with a serious number.
What we can still see is that in countries where guns are banned, crime is lower. This is NOT a proof, but this is an indication that that banning guns might lower crime rate... by how much ? Don't know, might be 0%, might be 70%.
ever heard of a "citizen's arrest"
non police can arrest people.
Well giving the right tool for the job makes the job a lot more easier. Persistent fellow might do the job without the correct tool.
I think that a pissed off guy with a grudge might do almost any job, without having the right tool handy.
Were I pissed off guy, who hates the society/police department/justice system, I could easily get enought explosives [given enough time, and it really _is_ plenty] to blow almost any building up. And as I were persistent enough, I wouldn't mind the job taking few years, or maintaining a low profile.
Before any cognitive thinking takes place:
1. Use the god damn scientific method. There are many variables to take into consideration. Analyze the situation. Don't jump to conclusions when you've seen the issue brought up in the equally clueless media. Never make an assumption, and use CITED data to back up your argument.
2. Single Causation fallacy: the error of believing that a single factor caused an event, when in fact it had many causes.
3. Cause-and-Effect fallacy: is to believe that because event x occurs before event y; x causes y.
Example: Day follows before night, therefore day(event A) causes night (event B).
4. Subjectivity: is the perception of observed facts in the light of our own biases and theories that we accept.
5. Loaded terminology: is the use of emotionally-loaded terms in an attempt to sway opinion.
6. Personification of a problem: the oversimplification of a problem or a situation by identifying it with a prominent person.
7. Fallacy of composition: states that what is true for an individual is not necessarily true for a whole.
example: you are watching your favorite football team in a championship game. Suddenly, your team executes a number of brilliant plays and looks if they are about to score. To see the game better you jump to your feet. Standing you can see the game perfectly -- that is, until everyone else stands too. Then, no one can see well. Sound similar to these idiotic gun extremists who believe that everyone should carry a gun?
If there had been more gun control in the first place, semi-automatic weapons wouldn't be produced.
crack is illegal to produce, yes it is not hard to obtain.
Obviously, her problem was too much time spent on the internet and Doom-style roleplaying games!
Lets face it -- kids have been killing for a long time. With a tenfold increase in population, you would expect a tenfold increase in incidents. Facts is, the number of incidence has not even kept up with the population increase -- we've just got much better technology with which to report the incidents so it SEEMS like there are more. Unfortunately, we've also got better technology with which to go postal.)
You think nobody went postal 100 years ago? 1000 years ago? You don't know your history very well. People haven't changed. Technology has.
Look at switserland where ownrship of military weapons is mandated.
very little crime.
They would have used the bombs if they couldn't use the guns.
More ppl would have died.
At a school, in my town a kid was killed in schoos with a pen.
Killing animals for sport is acceptable? Jeffrey Dahmer started by killing animals and his neighbourhood. Acceptable maybe in survival, but killing for fun is the lowest act there is -- no matter what species.
Problem is, these "warning signs" probably apply to several hundred thousand kids! Most teens go through a stage of alienation and anger... are you going to intervene in EVERY teenagers life?
A friend of mine in high school owned canons.
Friend of mine built pyrotecnic devices and canons in college. To the best of my knowledge, none of them went postal.
And speaking of Hitler... how come HIS parents ignored the warning signs?
Guns are very usefull: protection, hunting.
Absolutely true.
Usually, when you wave a gun in someone's face, they will leave without you having to shoot.
America may get respect for a lot of things. The right to bear arms is not one of those things.
That's only in countries thst don't give you that right.
See post two threads up... Idiot.
When I come out of a violent movie, I feel pumped up and ready to do violence -- however, real violence is not in my repertoire of socially acceptable behavior. In my opinion, what you get out of the violent media you watch is largely based on your disposition BEFORE watching it. If you're playfully violent like me, it will feed that. If you're a socially excluded, estranged student with vehement emotional burden, then it will fuel that.
Are you part of a well-regulated militia?
all citizens are. read the federalist papers.
Why does Canada also have much lower murder rates? Compare the statistics between Seattle and Vancouver sometime.
compare the murder rates between Warez (mex) and El Paso (US:TX) mex has much more stringent gun laws than canada yet the murder rate is much higher.
I've never owned a gun, never shot a gun, and no one in my family has ever owned a gun. But I think I'll go buy a bunch just to piss you Marxists off.
BTW, what do you think Hitler did right before he started killing Jews --- He took away all their guns. Same with every other dictator this century. But I suppose, you're so comfortable with your Marxist ideology, you believe "Oh, that will never happen here." Wake up.
Secularism has killed far, far more, especially this century.
It is turning out that the shooters in Colorado were after Christians, and shot a number of them. Perhaps due to the climate of hate that people like you and the Clinton's foster.
Exactly. The media is quick to use idiotic single causation fallacy to boost ratings. If they blow a single issue out of proportion it will get them ratings. I was watching CNN crossfire yesterday and they had a mother putting the blame largely on the internet and media. There was also someone who acts in violent movies, but he unfortunately did not have a way with words, so the emotionally-charged drivel that the mother was blabbing about probably won over the viewers. She went on to blame the 30 billion dollar entertainment industry for problems that have existed forever in organized human society. This was also the occurence in Elizabethan England. Some towns believed that plays would corrupt the citizens and they should not be subjected to material that was straight from the devil.
So does that mean we must legalise crack ? After all crack doesn't kill, it's people who use it who kill (themselves).
"I would think that most of the violence is related to drugs and less to random acts of terror."
Ever hear of the term "drive by shooting"?
The drugs are the reason for the readily available supply of cash which translates into a supply of weaponry to protect yourself from enterprising young upstarts who view your territory as ripe for a leveraged takeover or hostile acquisition.
Innocents get killed everyday in the crossfire and turf wars.
But because they die singularly (or in twos and threes), they aren't considered a "massacre".
And because they're black and hispanic, they aren't considered "news".
As to whether these killings are "acts of terror", I think you should look into the meaning of that phrase. A terrorist uses acts of terror to achieve his/her political/religious goals. These people were on a suicide mission to kill as many people as possible. They had no political agenda or religious goals.
This wasn't a hate crime. They didn't target ONLY jocks or whomever. They exploded bombs that killed anyone in the area.
Now, an act of terror would be to plant a bomb in the gym during PE. The important thing would be for no one to know who did it or if it would happen again. That's where the TERROR comes in.
A hate crime would be to plant a bomb on the football team's bus when they go out for a game.
This was random violence. Very extreme, but still random. It won't be happening again (not from those people). Nor will it achieve any political goals. They hated some people at the school, but they didn't limit themselves to only the people they hated.
This is another superficial Katz article with no research or depth.
Just like you.
OK, you keep posting those stupid biased "10 lies of the NRA" everywhere on this forum. Do you have actually something to say or are you just a NRA affiliate that is paid to brainwash /. readers with truncated statistics ?
That was because they didn't use (explode) all their boms.
At a school, in my town a kid was killed in schoos with a pen.
If the teachers at that school had been required to carry pens, they would have converged on this miscreant like WHITE CORPUSCLES (oops, forgot, I don't believe in cells because they imply evolution), er . . . like VICIOUS DOGS and, and, and, uh . . . SNUFFED THE LIFE out of the brutal killer BEFORE HE EVEN HAD A CHANCE to uncap his deadly pen!
Some aspects of every society are opressive. We seem to have relayed the idea -- coming from the puritan culture that originally landed here --that the natural act of sex as a means of pleasure is not acceptable for children (or adults in the puritan case) to see, or think about. It's definitely valid depending on what perspective you see it from.
Violence is a different beast entirely. This crime has a victim. However, the propensity for violence does exist in all humans also. Males even more so. Organized and moral society just keeps this in check.
Shure its about sex, the jocks get the girls.
And that thread would be? The only thread up two on mine is "Crime up 30% in Austrailia". If you're counting sub-threads as threads, then the second would be "There is no mystery here". This comment also jumps to conclusions as to saying that the internet and the media had no involvement. These do, but only as diminutive factors. If you've got a valid comment in the 1000 that I am not willing to read through, or one of your own, please respond.
In wars with sticks and swords more die than in wars with airplanes and mistles.
The "only in America" argument is flawed and false. People always say "not in my town it doesnt". I'd like to remind you that we are all human beings, and the underlying factors that caused these children to do these acts do exist in your country. Canada may be a little farther along in terms of violent crime controls, but in the end, there will always be unintelligible deviation from "normal" society in every country. Don't attack the country; it's all too easy.
Guns and nukes are very diferent.
I can kill a whole city with a nuke, but with a gun I couldn't kill a whole city even if noone fought back.
It would take way too long.
So what ? I prefer somebody who commits suicide rather than somebody who kill 13 persons and then commit suicice. People can do what they want of their life, including terminating it.
You should watch CNN and see if you can catch an interview with a woman who was friends with the killers, and was a member of the "Trenchcoat Mafia." She says the boys were constantly harassed, bullied, and beaten by jocks and "the Abercrombie & Fitch Mafia" (preppies). THESE are the people who caused the murders. Anyone can crack under this kind of continual harassment. And I've lived in Denver, if you aren't a cowboy or Jock, you're treated like shit.
Personally, while I don't condone murder, I think the boys hit the right targets. Look at the people who were killed: The basketball coach. The class valdectorian. Two fanatical christian prayer-group members. Several jocks. In short, it was a classic list of the people who make high school a complete hell for everyone who doesn't meet THEIR image of an ideal person.
It is time for the non-jock non-preppies to stand up to this bullying and abuse. America is a land where everyone has a right to be exactly who they want to be. And no goddam preppie or jock is going to ostracize ME because I'm different. Remember, jocks and preps are the MINORITY.
Enough rant. Go rent the movie "Revenge of the Nerds" and you'll see I'm not the only person who feels this way.
The environment, nature, past experience leading to current disposition et al. The idiot comment was perhaps out of line. I'm also not willing to argue with you about religion at this time. Just remember to never take anything as it is presented, or oversimplify an issue because arriving at the right conclusion would require too much mental effort.
Why a pipebomb? Foo Gas ( napalm) is so much eacier to make.
Yeah, right. Murphy (c) is a good Swiss name.
Imbecile. People can move. It's legal. I have an Irish name and I live in the U.S. I have a friend with an Irish name who lives in Germany, and another with a Russian name who lives in England. You have a brain the size of a walnut.
the 600,000 to 2,000,000 crimes in this country that are PREVENTED by guns?
I'm curious, really.
Personally, I think somebody at the NRA pulled that figure out of his ass, especially since all of you guys always loudly deny that gun crimes are statistically significant at all. Which is it? Do criminals only ever attack people with guns, who then almost invariably fend them off? I don't buy it.
Criminals with guns are this terrible bogeyman that you use to justify being armed to the teeth, but then in "proving" that guns are safe, you claim that nobody actually gets killed by guns (except by the police, who incidentally are better armed and far better trained than all of you put together).
They didn't have atomatic weapons(atomatic weapons==fire continuously while trigger is squeezed)
They had semi-atomic weapons(semi-atomic weapons ==one squeez one shot)
I've provide stats and studies from many sources. One source is the renowned criminologist Gary Kleck who is a card-carrying ACLU member and liberal Democrat. Unfortunately for liberal
orthodoxy, in true scientific fashion he is also willing to follow the facts wherever they lead unlike mindless anti-gun sheep common here.
Please come up with a scientific study that shows more guns equals more crime. Your opinions such as "a baseball bat is better for defense then a gun", and "criminals don't break into houses too often, do they?" don't count.
If you can't then stop spreading misinformation.
Please sir. Provide hard facts to back your claims or go away.
In home defense, and debates is best to come armed with valid amo.
Nah, Get a house-boat.
This Texan can live prety much anywhere he darn pleases.
No, you burn down the building, with well placed iniderary tools.
One can get a place going very quickly.
I know what you mean, I went to a new school
in grade nine the fucking class was white and I
wasn't. That sucked to say the least...the usual
daily nightmare ensued...
Now I'm a card carrying 100% misanthrope. I can't
trust anybody, but myself...
can we say "speed" a.k.a. crank
Amen. I've played every "violent" game since Duke Nukem 1. (Yep. Made me want to run out, grab a 2 dimentional gun, and shoot all the 2d people. Sure.) I also played with fire/explosives quite a bit as a kid, and only hurt myself(best way to learn, IMO)
As someone who's still in the hell known as adolesence, I can say that personal privacy is quite possibly the *MOST* important thing that can be given to a child. It fosters trust, and allows the kid a refuge from the world. No matter how bad it gets outside, you can always go back to your room.
As for Vektor's predicament, I have to recommend the hard road. As Jefferson said (IIRC), it is the citizen's duty to disobey an unjust government. Your parents are ignoring your right to your free expression (through threats of reprisals) and your privacy, so it is your duty to throw as many blocks in their attempts as possible. This means PGP everything and refuse to give them the password. This means outright refusal to show them your files. Unfortunatly, it will cause a great many problems for you, as they are likely to punish you. Try to sit down and talk to them. Explain that you value your privacy. And reach out to the online community for support. You'll get it.
Very insightful. It's hard to speculate as to what they were feeling and were planning when we don't fully understand how the human mind works.
If you use MS-DOS, attrib +h can do wonders. I learned that very early. Specially if the parents are computer-stupid. Under Linux, I use a four-level structure: personal (og-rx)/.../.somtehing/.../ . It's hard even for me when I forget the last part. And if they get smart, read the BOFH to learn the right attitude, then use PGP/rot13/crypt/XOR cipher/whatever to hide your data (within .tar.gz files). Or use the old hide-it-in-a-disk-that-is-hidden-under-my-bed trick.
And that's just the beginning of steganography - think about Mickey Mouse pictures with hidden porn on them.
We have jocks geeks and rifles in Canada so why not have this? You know why because we have less than 1/10th the population the states have. Therefore since there are 10 american incidents there will be 1 canadian incident probably soon.
Canada is also too spread out to have walk around.
> the kid is smart enough to know he shouldn't be
> doing it and to dumb to stop.
And if the kid's right and the parent's wrong?
Just my $0.02.
See http://flag.blackened.net/intanar k/faq/secJ6.html.
See http://flag.blackened.net/intanar k/faq/secJ6.html.
From my understanding, shortly after this happened, the gunmen shot themselves. It looks like they realized it was over at that moment. His exchange of gunfire probably kept them from killing other people.
please.
Why do people repeatedly referr to "Christian Fundamentalists" when talking about censorship. The fact is that most of the legislation trying to ban the stuff is all from liberal Democrats -- Lieberman, Tipper Gore, etc.
Just regarding (1) ... forget it. Might be though one day people start to accept that although humanity has made huge advances in other areas we are still animals in others.
... how ridiculous.
We still follow our instincts, we still live in tribes, drawing lines on pieces of paper and telling people which side they belong to and so on.
Bad luck though we are not able to cope with ourselves and it is for sure much easier to look for some scapegoat, whether it is the TV, the Internet or even junk food (Japan) than to take a look in the mirror. Humans had and have the ability to kill and they do. If in a war they become heros, if it happens in piece they are criminals
how does your excellency explain the practically nil gun incident rate in switzerland where practically everyone has a gun? how are you going to spew your way out of that one? don't repeat everything you hear on cnn/abc/nbc/cbs - think! i know it is hard - but do try:
can a gun 'make' you kill? can a rock 'make' you break a window? for that matter: can a woman 'make' you rape? (can i 'make' you think?)
let me point out that you have some stuff between your ears - it is your brain. learn how to use it.
This is longer than the one above!
Cool Idea!
What really bothers me here is that you are taking a single example I used and turning that into the centerpiece of this discussion.
No, I just made it the centerpiece of my post. For the most part, I was only discussing that one issue. I could have gone down all your other examples (most of which IIRC were reasonable) and agreed with all of them, and I suppose that would have been an emotionally healthy experience for you, but I was assuming that you could deal with it. You know, you post something, and somebody disagrees with it, in whole or in part. It happens. I can't see the point of posting something that everybody agrees with, because then there would be no discussion. Where's the fun in that?
You see, I really couldn't care less about this one example.
Then why include it? You can't just disavow it like that. You can back off and say, "hey, okay, that was a lousy example because it's reasonably debatable, and it dragged the whole discussion off-track." You could say that. You still can.
It was to make a point,
Are you suggesting that facts offerd in support of a point need not be accurate? IMHO if the facts are wrong, the point is suspect, in cases where the facts are the only thing supporting the point. I would imagine that this is why you included them, right?
which you are ignoring,
You're asking me to accept this example as partial proof of your thesis. The validity of the example is therefore entirely relevant.
Of course, you're not saying much about my point, so hey, fair's fair, innit?
and I still feel it is a fairly valid example.
AHA! Now you're addressing the issues in my post! Groovy. I still disagree, though.
Coffee is expected to be hot . . . Eggrolls are expected *not* to have broken glass in them.
I could quote somebody I ran into on the net today . . . "I really couldn't care less about this one example." -- but I won't, because I hassled you for the same thing and I'd rather discuss this in a rational way than start a flame war (although that might be fun).
The eggroll thing is a borderline example, granted, but try stepping back a bit and looking at it like so: "Food is expected *not* to hurt you in the course of normal use." Coffee does spill, that's not abnormal. That's why geeks wear plaid shirts. If the woman had medical bills resulting from the incident, the coffee must necessarily have been really abnormally hot, because I've spilled hot coffee on myself many times with no ill effects (unless I was wearing a white shirt -- never drink coffee while driving to a job interview) (btw I got the job anyway
Whether it's hot, really hot, or 'hotter than she could reasonably expect' is irrelevant.
'hotter than she could reasonably expect' is different. If it's known to be that hot, a prudent person will be more than ordinarily careful with it. A better analogy than the eggroll might be a toaster that catches fire when there's a light dusting of crumbs in the bottom. Yes, toasters are meant to produce heat, and, yes, you should clean out the damn crumbs. But a reasonably prudent person who won't come to grief with a normal toaster, might end up with a fire. The law makes a lot of noise about words like "prudent" and "reasonable". You should certainly go through life with some damn common sense, but people can't reasonably (there we go again) go through life treating every single object they encounter as a deadly menace. Some things, yes. Guns for example. Also lawn mowers, weed whackers, and chainsaws. How many lawsuits do you hear about where somebody hurts himself with a chainsaw and sues Stihl? Not many, because the court would die laughing. A chainsaw is reasonably expected to be really goddamn dangerous. Of course, one could imagine a chainsaw where the chain breaks on first use and snaps back at the user. If the user was using it in a reasonable way (e.g. not on concrete or granite), I suppose he'd have a case, but I'm not a lawyer. He'd certainly have to prove that the defect resulted from negligence on the part of the manufacturer. I mean, if the manufacturer exercises reasonable prudence, he can just say, "look, there are limits to what we can be expected to anticipate". There are indeed limits to what anybody can be expected to anticipate, and the question here is whether or not the coffee exceeded those limits.
I do *not* believe that after the old lady had the coffee spilled she should be kicked in the ass, ignored, and thrown to the wolves.
I merely suggested indifference and passive hostility, not active aggression. I certainly don't think that you go around attacking old ladies, nor that you condone such actions. Of course, some old ladies are a real pain in the ass, but that's another discussion.
she should not expect everyone to immediately take responsibility for her spill.
Here, I think, is where we're parting ways. I don't think she expected anybody to take responsibility for the spill; I think she expected McDonald's to take responsibility for the fact that they sold her coffee that was so damn hot that a minor spill became a major problem. This whole matter can be settled by getting some hard information on what her medical bills actually amounted to. If it was more than a few bucks for bandaids (inflated to a several hundred by emergency room price inflation), then she had a case. I have spilled a lot of coffee on myself, and have never been hurt enough to require any attention at all. Coffee that injures is not normal coffe. Note that the damages awarded started out as just medical expenses, and then punitive damages were awarded due to the behavior of McDonald's after the accident. The theory of punitive damages is not that the plaintiff deserves it, so much as that the defendant needs to be slapped down.
Hey, how's this: I invite somebody to my house. I serve coffee. My guest is clumsy and spills it, and it's so hot that a trip to the hospital results. What kind of a prick would I be if I said "tough shit, not my problem" to my guest?
how everyone else reacts, and who does and doesn't help her, isn't the topic of my post or this discussion.
IMHO it is precisely the topic. What I'm looking at here is how we react to the misfortune of others: Do we give a shit, or not? Do we try to find excuses to blow it off, or not? In which direction do we run?
Katz must be really famous!
Sh!t happens. And if Sh!t is going to come at me with guns and bombs, then I sure as heck would like the oportunity to defend myself.
Try to moderate _this_ down. Hehehe. :-)
They had lots of pipebombs. They would have used them.
Thanks. Beautifully spoken.
What I should have said is that the US murder rate due to firearms is much higher than in other western countries.
:After this!=Because of this. Any high school logic class will teach you that.
Well, duh. But if you really think that the accessibility of guns in the US has the same effect as beef consumption does on the murder rate, then you've swallowed too much of the crap the gun lobby spews out.
The ONLY things I see is THREADS and THREADS full of MORONS:
a) saying guns should be banned
b) saying guns should not be banned
c) saying parenting was the problem
d) offtopic
I CAN'T STAND IT ANYMORE!!! IT'S ALL KATZ'S FAULT!!!!!! EVERYTHING IS KATZ'S FAULT!!!!!!!!
Sorry. Got carried away.
I'm not sure what you mean by "standing up" to those annoying people, but if you mean anything violent, you're wrong. You don't even need to be fairly aggressive about it, just ignore them. It works. If they don't even care to respect other peoples value systems', and then see the same directed upon them, maybe things will change a little. Sure, they probably don't care about most of those people, but there are often a few who they do respect as people. I think I'm saying to responsibly face up to the truth of the situation with these people, rather than acting like you're oppressed. Sorry, perhaps this just doesn't apply in most situations, but it worked for me.
People are just using this to further their own political agendas.
Well, I thought that the most appropriate rebuttal would be to quote from the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Rights. So here goes.
Article 1.
All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
(Notice the word "ALL". All human beings. Not all human beings over the age of 18.)
Article 3.
Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.
(Security of person. Hmm. Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't that include the search of personal property?)
Article 13.
(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state.
(Hmm. Sounds to me like curfews violate this.)
Article 19.
Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.
(Freedom of opinion and expression without interference? Searching someone's personal effects for evidence that they have been doing "anti-social behaviour" and implied threats of punishment sound like interference. It also says that you may use any medium to express yourself. Bits are media.)
Article 25.
(2) Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. All children, whether born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection.
(Notice the words "ALL CHILDREN". Again, an affirmation of the rights of the child)
Article 27.
(2) Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the author.
(Protection of artistic expression. Diaries are literary expression. That diary is the sole property of Vektor. Not his parents.)
Article 30.
Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein.
(And, no, parents aren't allowed to bend these rights for their children. No person may interfere with anyone else's rights.)
There. I think that did it pretty well. And yes, I know that these are ideals, and that the US has a poor track record with them. But that's not the point.
The murderers that commit all these school shoootings, they're emotionally disturbed. But, quite a few people knew. That's the thing. Some didn't do anything and just thought to themselves "Oh, it's just growing pains, he'll get over it, there's nothing really wrong".
Others, however, reported it. But you know what the police did? Next to nothing. They talked to the parents for a few minutes then went to stockpile glazed donuts. That's the thing that angers *me* so much.
-Digital_Fiend
Please sir. Provide hard facts to back your claims or go away.
his claims are easily proven. he said that you morons keep barfing up the same stupid list of talking points. it's all you have. it happens to be bullshit, but that's not even the point.
his claim is absolutely correct. you know it and i know it. read the posts in this discussion. it's all you've got.
now go back on your medication and leave rational people in peace.
We need more people like you.
[blush, low bow] Thank you.
Of course, some nut'll probably take the numbers in your original post as gospel, and before you know it it WILL be official NRA statistics...be afraid...
Heh. Man, that is probably true. And it's a very damn funny thought. I don't think it would be a bad thing, though. After all, my statistics were deliberatly nonsensical, right? They're easily debunked. In fact, I tried to fabricate statistics such that it would be almost impossible not to debunk them. If the NRA wants to alert the public to the danger of drive-by knifings in which twelve or more people are killed, hey, that's fine by me. The more they erode their credibility, the happier I am.
It would be so cool to see those figures come back from somebody who believes them. A trojan horse of sorts.
Hmmm . . .
Are you thinking what I'm thinking?
:)
My history teacher was reguralarly beat-up in hawaii in the 50's because he was white.
give me an an M1 abram any day.
But they didn't go Nazi on you. Actually, you are the only Nazi here.
Since much of these threads have devolved into "pro-gun" vs. "anti-gun" arguments anyway...
> [the wording of the 2nd Amendment] implies a connection between a regulated militia, and the right to bear arms.
[The following was submitted by walter.sorton@proom.com (Walter Sorton).
It was part of a discussion thread that originated with someone
asking for arguments to support the position that the Second
Amendment to the United States Constitution affirmed the right of
individual citizens to keep and bear arms.]
------------------------- begin included text
If you are looking for imediate info on the second amendment, I supply the
following. Hope it helps.
THE UNABRIDGED SECOND AMENDMENT
by J. Neil Schulman
If you wanted to know all about the Big Bang, you'd ring up
Carl Sagan, right? And if you wanted to know about desert
warfare, the man to call would be Norman Schwartzkopf, no
question about it. But who would you call if you wanted the top
expert on American usage, to tell you the meaning of the Second
Amendment to the United States Constitution?
That was the question I asked Mr. A.C. Brocki, Editorial
Coordinator of the Los Angeles Unified School District and
formerly senior editor at Houghton Mifflin Publishers -- who
himself had been recommended to me as the foremost expert on
English usage in the Los Angeles school system. Mr. Brocki told
me to get in touch with Roy Copperud, a retired professor of
journalism at the University of Southern California and the
author of \American Usage and Style: The Consensus\.
A little research lent support to Brocki's opinion of
Professor Copperud's expertise.
Roy Copperud was a newspaper writer on major dailies for
over three decades before embarking on a distinguished seventeen-
year career teaching journalism at USC. Since 1952, Copperud has
been writing a column dealing with the professional aspects of
journalism for \Editor and Publisher\, a weekly magazine focusing
on the journalism field.
He's on the usage panel of the American Heritage Dictionary,
and Merriam Webster's Usage Dictionary frequently cites him as an
expert. Copperud's fifth book on usage, \American Usage and
Style: The Consensus\, has been in continuous print from Van
Nostrand Reinhold since 1981, and is the winner of the
Association of American Publishers' Humanities Award.
That sounds like an expert to me.
After a brief telephone call to Professor Copperud in which
I introduced myself but did \not\ give him any indication of why
I was interested, I sent the following letter:
***
"July 26, 1991
"Dear Professor Copperud:
"I am writing you to ask you for your professional opinion as
an expert in English usage, to analyze the text of the Second
Amendment to the United States Constitution, and extract the
intent from the text.
"The text of the Second Amendment is, 'A well-regulated
Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the
right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be
infringed.'
"The debate over this amendment has been whether the first
part of the sentence, "A well-regulated Militia, being necessary
to the security of a free State," is a restrictive clause or a
subordinate clause, with respect to the independent clause
containing the subject of the sentence, "the right of the people
to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."
"I would request that your analysis of this sentence not take
into consideration issues of political impact or public policy,
but be restricted entirely to a linguistic analysis of its
meaning and intent. Further, since your professional analysis
will likely become part of litigation regarding the consequences
of the Second Amendment, I ask that whatever analysis you make be
a professional opinion that you would be willing to stand behind
with your reputation, and even be willing to testify under oath
to support, if necessary."
My letter framed several questions about the text of the
Second Amendment, then concluded:
"I realize that I am asking you to take on a major
responsibility and task with this letter. I am doing so because,
as a citizen, I believe it is vitally important to extract the
actual meaning of the Second Amendment. While I ask that your
analysis not be affected by the political importance of its
results, I ask that you do this because of that importance.
"Sincerely,
"J. Neil Schulman"
***
After several more letters and phone calls, in which we
discussed terms for his doing such an analysis, but in which we
never discussed either of our opinions regarding the Second
Amendment, gun control, or any other political subject, Professor
Copperud sent me the following analysis (into which I've inserted
my questions for the sake of clarity):
***
[Copperud:] The words "A well-regulated militia, being
necessary to the security of a free state," contrary to the
interpretation cited in your letter of July 26, 1991, constitute
a present participle, rather than a clause. It is used as an
adjective, modifying "militia," which is followed by the main
clause of the sentence (subject "the right," verb "shall"). The
right to keep and bear arms is asserted as essential for
maintaining a militia.
In reply to your numbered questions:
[Schulman: (1) Can the sentence be interpreted to grant the
right to keep and bear arms \solely\ to "a well-regulated
militia"?;]
[Copperud:] (1) The sentence does not restrict the right to
keep and bear arms, nor does it state or imply possession of the
right elsewhere or by others than the people; it simply makes a
positive statement with respect to a right of the people.
[Schulman: (2) Is "the right of the people to keep and bear
arms" \granted\ by the words of the Second Amendment, or does the
Second Amendment assume a preexisting right of the people to keep
and bear arms, and merely state that such right "shall not be
infringed"?;]
[Copperud:] (2) The right is not granted by the amendment;
its existence is assumed. The thrust of the sentence is that the
right shall be preserved inviolate for the sake of ensuring a
militia.
[Schulman: (3) Is the right of the people to keep and bear
arms conditioned upon whether or not a well-regulated militia is,
in fact, necessary to the security of a free State, and if that
condition is not existing, is the statement "the right of the
people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed" null and
void?;]
[Copperud:] (3) No such condition is expressed or implied.
The right to keep and bear arms is not said by the amendment to
depend on the existence of a militia. No condition is stated or
implied as to the relation of the right to keep and bear arms and
to the necessity of a well-regulated militia as requisite to the
security of a free state. The right to keep and bear arms is
deemed unconditional by the entire sentence.
[Schulman: (4) Does the clause "A well-regulated Militia,
being necessary to the security of a free State," grant a right
to the government to place conditions on the "right of the people
to keep and bear arms," or is such right deemed unconditional by
the meaning of the entire sentence?;]
[Copperud:] (4) The right is assumed to exist and to be
unconditional, as previously stated. It is invoked here
specifically for the sake of the militia.
[Schulman: (5) Which of the following does the phrase "well-
regulated militia" mean: "well-equipped," "well-organized,"
"well-drilled," "well-educated," or "subject to regulations of a
superior authority"?]
[Copperud:] (5) The phrase means "subject to regulations of
a superior authority"; this accords with the desire of the
writers for civilian control over the military.
[Schulman: If at all possible, I would ask you to take into
account the changed meanings of words, or usage, since that
sentence was written two-hundred years ago, but not to take into
account historical interpretations of the intents of the authors,
unless those issues can be clearly separated.]
[Copperud:] To the best of my knowledge, there has been no
change in the meaning of words or in usage that would affect the
meaning of the amendment. If it were written today, it might be
put: "Since a well-regulated militia is necessary to the security
of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms
shall not be abridged."
I would also appreciate it if you could compare your analysis of
the text of the Second Amendment to the following sentence,
"A well-schooled electorate, being necessary to the security
of a free State, the right of the people to keep and read Books,
shall not be infringed."
My questions for the usage analysis of this sentence would
be,
(1) Is the grammatical structure and usage of this sentence,
and the way the words modify each other, identical to the Second
Amendment's sentence?; and
(2) Could this sentence be interpreted to restrict "the
right of the people to keep and read Books" \only\ to "a well-
educated electorate" -- for example, registered voters with a
high-school diploma?]
[Copperud:] (1) Your "scientific control" sentence precisely
parallels the amendment in grammatical structure.
(2) There is nothing in your sentence that either indicates
or implies the possibility of a restricted interpretation.
***
Professor Copperud had only one additional comment, which he
placed in his cover letter: "With well-known human curiosity, I
made some speculative efforts to decide how the material might be
used, but was unable to reach any conclusion."
So now we have been told by one of the top experts on
American usage what many knew all along: the Constitution of the
United States unconditionally protects the people's right to keep
and bear arms, forbidding all government formed under the
Constitution from abridging that right.
As I write this, the attempted coup against constitutional
government in the Soviet Union has failed, apparently because
the will of the people in that part of the world to be free from
capricious tyranny is stronger than the old guard's desire to
maintain a monopoly on dictatorial power.
And here in the United States, elected lawmakers, judges,
and appointed officials who are pledged to defend the
Constitution of the United States ignore, marginalize, or
prevaricate about the Second Amendment routinely. American
citizens are put in American prisons for carrying arms, owning
arms of forbidden sorts, or failing to satisfy bureaucratic
requirements regarding the owning and carrying of firearms -- all
of which is an abridgement of the unconditional right of the
people to keep and bear arms, guaranteed by the Constitution.
And even the ACLU, staunch defender of the rest of the Bill
of Rights, stands by and does nothing.
It seems it is up to those who believe in the right to keep
and bear arms to preserve that right. No one else will. No one
else can. Will we beg our elected representatives not to take away
our rights, and continue regarding them as representing us if they
do? Will we continue obeying judges who decide that the Second
Amendment doesn't mean what it says but means whatever they
say it means in their Orwellian doublespeak?
Or will we simply keep and bear the arms of our choice, as
the Constitution of the United States promises us we can, and
pledge that we will defend that promise with our lives, our
fortunes, and our sacred honor?
Copyright (c) 1991 by The New Gun Week and Second Amendment
Foundation. Informational reproduction of the entire
article is hereby authorized provided the author, The New
Gun Week and Second Amendment Foundation are credited.
All others rights reserved.
* SLMR 2.1a * Some people are wise; others are otherwise.
------------------------- end included text
So there you go. If the above analysis is credible (and I hardly see how one can believe
otherwise!), there is absolutely no connection whatsoever between "a well regulated militia"
and whether such is actually "necessary to the security of a free State", and "the right of
the people to keep and bear arms."
Of course, this being a free country, you're free to believe whatever you want--whether
there's any rational basis for your belief or not. I only ask that that others not impose
their irrational belief systems on *me*!
140 degrees f
a first degree burn is like a medium sunburn.
Damn! I KNEW white kids couldn't have done something like this without BLACK people being involved!
I've been wondering that too: How are the Ku Kluxers going to shift the blame onto blacks? White killers, mostly white suburb, mostly white victims, white Marilyn Manson . . . It's a tough one. I don't envy the poor dumb bastards who have to engineer some way to put a racial spin on it.
We'll if the parents of the 'victims' wern't shitheads and didn't raise monsters then they probably wouldn't have been killed. Lets face it, most of them deserved to die. Perhaps it wan't right, but that doesn't make it wrong. Those kids the TCM killed were heartless cold and evil, just like the socity their school mirrored in miniture. They all deserved to die. If there was a travisty here, it was that they didn't kill enough and the media is still clueless.
...in the state forests of texas there are armed people with missle launchers...
...that Katz very carefully side-stepped this issue this time around?
:-)?
I wonder why?
Perhaps he's studied the issues more carefully and has changed his opinion?
Perhaps he carefully examined the events particular to this particular tragedy
and determined that firearms were a non-issue?
Or perhaps he wasn't interested in attracting the flames he knew he'd be sure
to get if he spouted the "party line" in this particular forum
What the hell are you talking about?! The only tragity here was that they didn't kill more! Most of those childeren were monsters! They deserve to die! It would be a BIG favor to socity to kill every student in every school monday morning!
And besides, you should be happy.. This will provide you w/ the scapegoat to push your dumb gun laws. (btw- I dont like guns, but I dont like laws either).
There isn't a Geeky, Smart Male support group.
What do you think slashdot is.
I *try* to be an optimist. However, the simple truth is that there are some realities in life and in human nature that we can not control. We do equal evils to our animal cousins as we do to ourselves. Conflict, death, violence, and discord will exist forever; but so will love, compassion, and peace. Introspection is the key. Pointing fingers just fuels a flame. Let us take something positive from this.
Omne initium est difficile.
They only killed one black person.
If you disagree with my assessment, please
say why and where.
> Sound similar to these idiotic gun extremists who believe that everyone should
> carry a gun?
No more so than these idiotic anti-gun extremists who believe that law-abiding
citizens should be denied the right.
I note with not a little irony that you've managed to violate several of your own
points with that last, loaded question.
Some might call your attitude hypocritical.
And to set the record straight: pro-gun rights folk certainly do not "believe
that everyone should carry a gun." We believe that law-abiding citizens should
not be denied the right should they choose to exercise it. Big difference.
Ugh. 1980's glam metal. The creepy thing is that parents used to be worried about that bland, sterile, dickless, frizzy twaddle. Good heavens.
Good thing those poor parents never heard the Stooges. "I'll rape you, baby, you rape me . .
And Iggy fucking MEANT it, man. That boy was not kidding. EEEEOWOOWOWOOOOOOWWWWWWW! YOW YOW!
GARRRRRRAAGGHGGHRRBHGHHEEEEEEGHGHGHGHGHG!!!!!
Wow. The fucking Stooges. Yeah. Now THERE was a BAND. Take "Cock in My Pocket", for example. That is what you call a fucking SONG TITLE, baby. Heh. "1969". If you aren't yelping and jumping up and down right now the same way I am, go out and buy all the records you can find that say "Stooges" on them. Do it NOW. You must. You must. If the store isn't open, that's okay, you can just break all the windows. You must have Stooges records. Anyhow, when you get home with your new acquisitions, PLAY 'EM ALL REALLY REALLY FUCKING LOUD.
You've heard Iggy doing "Lust for Life" on the radio? Yeah, it kicks ass . . . but, can you say, "pale, pale, pale shadow of massive, flesheating, mind-crunching greatness"? I knew you could.
Listen to Stooges. NOW. They will eat your brain and feed it back to you in small pieces. You will thank them for this. They ate enraged mountain gorillas for breakfast. They were BAD-ASS MOTHERFUCKERS. They were cool. In their final months, the drummer didn't even talk, he just growled. This was not an act, it took him three years after that to get off his heroin habit and reintegrate into society. He was a motherfucker. He was a fine, fine motherfucker named Scott Asheton, and god bless him because he was a hell of a fucking drummer as well. He was just plain scary. Very very few drummers can do that stuff right, that kind of pure abandoned raw energy maniac thing, but controlled and tight. He could do it. He could fucking DO it. Oh, god, yes.
GARRRRRRAAGGHGGHRRBHGHHEEEEEEGHGHGHGHGHG!!!!!
I can't say it any better than that.
"Why do these assaults occur almost exclusively in rural or suburban areas?"
...
Well my guess is if you're a goth or a heavy metal head or something it's a lot easier to become alienated, bored, and isolated in smalltownville where people are more likely to be conformist and despise you for your differences - it's hard to be different and you don't see other people who are "different like you".
Cities are more diverse. Kids who are different or don't fit in will likely find somewhere else to fit in.
Sure there's violence in the "decaying inner city" warring drug gangs etc. etc. but not as many alienated wackos who get hooked on hating everyone and plan to go out in a blaze of glory. Drug dealers want to make money and may rub out their competitors but prolly won't be blowing up the school to do it.
If they lived in New York the "trench coat mafia" (amazing how the media fixated on this - how clueless can they get) would've been just another 10 goths out of 1000's. Maybe in that context they could've had a social life met a girl, dropped some qualudes and chilled.
Plus if they were poor they'd be too busy working to fantasize about hitler as much. You know what they say about idle hands
one embarks upon an course of murder/suicide only after one does not believe in hell.
very good point if you don't believe you will be eternally punished you might be more inclined to go on a sucide mission.
I am outraged at the poor quality of photos of the deceased and deranged murderers who perpetrate media-rich acts of wanton violence: mostly they are grainy, bad black-and-white scans of some Freshman Yearbook photo.
This has been bothering me as well. Those poor guys! I mean, guns and bombs and expensive sharp black trenchcoats, all of it, they did their damnedest to do this with some style -- and what do they get for it? The GEEKIEST pictures you ever saw, and that's all any of us see of them. How humiliating.
I thought the photo that was going to immortalize me in the minds of millions on the evening news would be one of me, pimply, awkward, and forced to smile in braces, I would seriously consider going on a killing rampage myself.
That's almost ironic, in a way, because you wouldn't be immortalized just yet if you waited -- and while waiting you could get some better pictures taken.
You have to think these things through. Maybe those kids didn't think it through. What a waste.
They were bisexuals.
The study to which you refer has been completely discredited. The methodology used
to reach the conclusions in that report were flawed.
IIRC: even the author himself has at least partially retracted his conclusions.
(Tho I'm not positive on that point.)
i'm waiting.
I'M STILL FUCKING WAITING, ASSHOLE. FUCKING ANSWER ME!
GODD FUCKING DAMMMMMMITTTT YOU FUCKING MUTANT, YOU GODDAMN MARTIAN, YOU FREAK, YOU TWISTED GENETICALLY ALTERED HUMAN CHIHAUHAU, MY GOD, YOUR TEETH ARE LIKE POPSICLES. IT'S DISGUSTING. WHAT ARE THOSE THINGS ON YOUR NECK? HOLY SHIT.
HOLY SGHIT!
TTHHEEYY''RREE MMOOVVIINNGG!!!!
EEEEYYYYAAAAGGGGHHHH!!
ohmigodohmigodohmigod. ohmigod.
no.
no.
no
DON'T PUT THAT THINGGGGGG ON ME OMIGOD
NNNNNOOOOOONONONONONONONONONONONONONOOOOOOO!
urk,
ackkkkckkkckkck
shit, dammit, go, go, lemme 'lone, ain't got no, not nostop stop stop stop that's not a snake that's a fucking alligator, no, i will not suck that thing off, you don't even know where the hell it's been, it's not my type, i hate that color. i hate it, absolutely hate it. fuck off, get me the hell out of here.
BLAMMO.
ee
eeee
ee
Good night.
They did forsee the new weapons.
That is why they said arms not muskets or guns.
doring the war for indipendence people called "privateers" had legally owned warships which they used to attack the british.
Whoa.
That's a rant and a half, dude.
I like it. Hell, I even agree with it.
Agree or no, hell, that was a damn fine rant. It flowed, you know? It had some wings there. It built, it had good energy and forward motion and it pulled up to a nice stop at the end. It carried me along.
I really liked the "thermodynamically unstable" part, too. Spread the word.
I agree with you. If the students were alloed to have guns (and be able to carry them), not as many people would of died. Taking away guns leaves people defensless. The criminals will always be able to get guns. I can MAKE a gun with things in my house (zip gun, more powerful ones are more compicated though but can be done). Guns REDUCE crime. Gun controll KILLS!
"Why do these assaults occur almost exclusively in rural or suburban areas?"
Well my guess is if you're a goth or a heavy metal head or something it's a lot easier to become alienated, bored, and isolated in smalltownville where people are more likely to be conformist and despise you for your differences - it's hard to be different and you don't see other people who are "different like you".
------
Oh yeah. It might interest you to know, two kids in a small town in Iowa (Vinton, I think) were expelled from school for merely WEARING black trenchcoats. They wore them as a joke, but they were obviously expressing their own disgruntlement with school. The school administrators called the police, the whole community is up in arms, with parents volunteering to "stand watch" at the school doors. And you know what the local newscaster asked the reporter? "Were any criminal charges filed?" Sheesh! As far as I know, it is legal to wear a black trenchcoat in a public school.
Yes, it is.
:-).
But it is futher complicated by the sheer volume of baseless rhetoric--much of it
based on "belief" rather than objective evaluation.
In my studies of the issues--and I've done a *lot* of studying--I have come to the
conclusion that both sides of the debate are guilty of bending the truth.
*But* (and I know this will call my opinon into question--so be it), in my
experience the anti-gun crowd appears to be far more frequently, and far more
blatantly, guilty than the pro-gun rights advocates.
Nonetheless, I'm glad to see that you've devoted more thought to the issue and
ceased being a "knee-jerk" anti-gun flak
I think a bit more thoughful consideration of the issues by both camps would not
be out-of-order. By the same token, I rather suspect that more gun control is
unlikely to have much effect. In my opinion: more consistent, and more stringent
enforcement of the laws already on the books, with *serious*, no-nonsense
penalties for firearms abuse would be more effective.
But the laws must be reasonable. Restricting the rights of law-abiding citizens to
keep and bear arms I do not regard as reasonable. Unreasonable drug laws have
done little to discourage drug use or the drug trade. I do not think we would
profit by repeating this terribly failed exercise with firearms as well.
If you can believe it, there are animal rights supporters who also support gun rights. It's a rare combination, perhaps, but the "guns for hunting" point is a decoy (not to mention a barbarism): the real point of guns, of course, is to kill people, or to present a credible threat of killing people, when necessary.
Helloooo, anyone ever heard of James Madison? The fellow who wrote the 2nd Amendment? Most pro-gun lobbyists use his writings for support. Semantic analysis is very nice and all, but provides no substitute for a brain. Seemingly a point you have missed. But he made quite clear what 'well-regulated" meant, in a large body of works. Try starting with the Virginia State Constitution. Anyone can semantically analyze, for example, what I write, but only I am qualified to tell what I actually meant. Thus, I tend to trust Mr. Madison's explanations of his intent, not a moronic cut & paste that misses the point by about the same margin as those people who think that the internet caused the massacre.
that's a bit of a weak connection, don't you think? you might as well say "don't vote for a politician who doesn't eat meat: hitler was a vegetarian & look what happened there"
hitler didn't just take away the jews' guns. he also took their pets. and their homes, their occupations, their right to use public transit.
whereas gun control laws attempt to legislate the ownership & operation of a commodity (guns), in much the same way that automobiles are legislated.
and they are intended to protect us from unbalanced teens who celebrate hitler's birthday by executing minorities and devout christians.
"Though I admit that them not knowing about all that bomb building has me stumped."
-
I built a lot of bombs and similarly interesting devices while in high school too, and believe me it is not difficult to do so without one's parents knowing about it. You just stash the stuff in places they habitually ignore, and you pull it out and insert tab A into slot B when they're not at home. You'll find places near the suburbs (the cops tend not to patrol "nice" suburbs, so you just have to find a place in a "nice" suburb away from residents) to set them off and admire your handiwork.
-
Remember, kids have a lot of advantages over adults. Adults have to divide their time and energy between their spouses, their kids, the property, the government (taxes et al), and their work. Adults get tired faster than kids, too. Kids may lack the experience of their elders, but they're not dumb. They have time and energy to watch and plan, and since they've usually *never* done this before, it is exciting and new and they therefore find it very easy to focus their minds very precisely on carrying out their plans as well as they can. When people get older, it's harder to find that focus because it's rarer that you find yourself doing that you've never done before, and you no longer have novelty to help you along.
Kids *will* find a way. They will acquire guns, and drugs, and alcohol, and violent movies and video games, and porn and "obscene" music no matter WHAT their parents or the government do -- IF they want to get them badly enough.
Tragedies like this one are the natural consequence of mixing NORMAL human adolescent desires with a technologically advanced industrialized society which makes very powerful tools easily available. Unless you want to lobotomize children at birth or disassemble our industrial infrastructure, you'll just have to accept all of this as a fact of life.
-
-- Guges --
-
Some seven years ago or more, the state of Florida passed a liberalized
concealed-carry law. (These are usually known as "shall issue" laws.)
In spite of predictions by the opponents of this legislation, crime in
all categories has actually decreased. (More accurately: it's
increased at a far lower rate than the rest of the country.)
Many other states have followed suit: passing similar "shall issue"
laws. (About 30 so far, I believe.) Their crime stats so far have
tended to echo Florida's experience. (Although in many of these
states the new law has not been in place long enough for there to be
sufficient data from which to derive meaningful statistics.)
In no case have any of these states experienced an increase in crime in
any category, so far as I know. Furthermore, the rate of criminal
abuse by concealed-carry licensees is almost non-existent.
And IIRC (I could be wrong on this one): violent crime, in particular,
has seen the largest decreases.
The truth is, no study to date has shown any correlation whatsoever
between gun ownership, or the routine bearing of firearms by the
law-abiding populace, and crime--violent or otherwise. None.
These are *facts* derived from FBI and DOJ stats.
Make of it what you will. Believe it or not.
He's saying that the problem is the societal obsession with guns, as that seems to be the only common difference btwn. the various industrialized countries. "Obsession" as in "illness," not as in "eccentricity". Hence if Americans don't develop a healthier attitude toward gun culture, this sort of thing is bound to continue. Hence the laws have very little effect.
The telling thing is how many people jumped on the mere idea that "there is something unhealthy with a morbid social fascination with gun" and assumed that it equals "gun control." I think they just proved that very point for all to see. A little paranoia may be useful sometimes, but really folks - if you're that paranoid that somebody is going to take your toys away...
Sir, I must ask this: How old are you? 60? 70? Old
enough to have forgotten what adolescence is LIKE? Ya moron. That jackboot fascist hell you describe is one I would happily advocate the destruction of, and the execution of those who created it. Start there, and where would it end, hm?
Alpha Wolf
Why is this being rehashed? "The Public and the Internet: Open Forum" from Hemos which just turned into about 900 posts of the guns vs no guns argument. Now we have this from Katz, followed by the same stupid arguments all over again.
all those factors being diminutive and behind the major factors. The parents, the school, the "school society", the attackers themselves, and perhaps a bit of chance.
It wouldnt have happened at all. They wanted to see the faces on the kids that they killed as they were doing it.
2. "Name more then half a dozen recorded instances in the last year". HAHAH! This is SO funny. You are so incensed by your hatred of gun rights your reasoning abilities are impared. Ok, well according to the Department of Justice Nactional Crime Victimization Survey (you know, one of those biased NRA publications) found at: http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/cvict.htm There were 4.8 MILLION household burglaries in 1997. Last time I checked 4.8 MILLION is bit larger then half a dozen. Also according to the DOJ, there were 3 MILLION assaults. So face it dude in ain't damn rare compared to mugging, in fact quite the opposite.
Another interesting note, different rate of so-called "hot burglaries" (when the residents are home when the criminals strike). In the US, the rate is 13%. In Canada and the UK where gun control laws keep guns out of law abiding citizens hands, the rate is 50%. Think and ponder this for a moment. Think a bit more, why would that be? Surveys of convicted felons in America reveals that they are much more worried about armed victims than they are about running into the police. This fear of potentially armed victims causes American burglars to spend more time than their foreign counterparts "casing" a house to ensure that nobody is home. Felons frequently comment in these interviews that they avoid late-night burglaries because "that's the way to get shot." [1]
[1] Wright and Rossi (1986, p. 151) interviewed felony prisoners in ten state correctional systems and found that 56 percent said that criminals would not attack a potential victim that was known to be armed. They also found evidence that criminals in those states with the highest levels of civilian gun ownership worried the most about armed victims.
but at least we've got our guns, god bless us.
Enough already.
Not the selfish gene theory again. blah blah blah, the jocks were on top of this "mini-society", and as selfish gene theory says, those on top get to propogate their genes.. Oh wait, a large % of teens didn't have sex when they were in high school -- they also killed themselves which completely invalidates the notion, because they cant have sex now can they. There were other factors which make more sense and are not a basic-theory-for-all-human-action, and arent so microscopic. Humans behavior is more complex than this.
If his claims are so easy to prove then do it. I've proven mine:
3 6230&threshold=0&commentsort=0&pid=12168
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=99/04/22/21
In israel they also have a common enemy. think about it.
I don't believe ANYONE will WANT to read this, but I feel compelled to go through the exercise. My opinion on this stems from a study of primate behaviour that I caught on one of those television shows often aired on PBS. It showed how some primates, normally territorial in nature, will fight to the extent of killing one another under certain circumstances. When allowed enough room these primates will fight for their territories, but the skirmishes are by-and-large not fatal and little injury is incurred. However, confine these same individuals to less and less space, at a critical space/individual they will become significantly more violent to one another.
I also believe that this model may translate to people. There may be areas where there appears to be plenty of room left and it isn't immediately clear that population density and our probable reactions to less and less of it may equate to that of the primates I mentioned, but consider this: we can rationalize abstract concepts, and whether one lives in a congested area or not, EVERYONE is aware that the world is becoming so. I believe that there may be a co-relation in this in that people can IMAGINE themselves to be under similar conditions that trigger those primates into violent behavior.
With this said, I don't see this getting any better, but worse. I don't think there will be enough people that will check their innate propensities to reproduce themselves. Unfortunately, this is not only innate in us naturally, but amplified by our religions.
It saddens me that such things happen. I am certainly anything but indifferent toward this particular incident, or people in general and my deepest sympathies go out to all that have been impacted by this.
Guyote
a
It wasnt a generalization. I was reading earlier posts that attempted to rationalize a society wherein the majority of people carried guns. Note the *some*. I am also not against firearms. I am against the propogated thought in society that believes that we have the right to kill others when our rights are infringed upon.
off.
What's a mistle?
Expect to see much more of this in the next several weeks. Eventually, it will be only Christians that they were targeting.
"I find it tragic that this happened, but an even greater tragedy would be if no lessons are learned from it."
I doubt anything will be learned from it. The parents and everyone else will just go one blaming the internet, Marilyn Manson, guns, Liberals, whatever; anything but the real culprits. As someone who endured years of taunting and harassment from my fellow "students" all through grade and high school, I well remember what it was like even though it's been over a decade since I graduated. I also remember daydreaming about killing them all with a machinegun or detonating a bomb in the school boiler room on a Monday morning to take out as many of those subhuman turds as I could.
Why didn't I?
My talent for writing is what saved me, I think. Many's the time I've instigated Littleton-type massacres in my town--on paper. That--plus the realization that success in life is the best revenge--is all that saved their worthless asses. And no, I didn't go to my HS reunion. Fuck 'em.
I believe that jocks and bops are too conformist and aren't tolerent of others.
In fact, Henry Hyde took Exon's bill, and, under the influence of rabid fundamentalist groups, made it worse. It was in that form that it was voted on, as part of the Telecommunications bill in Feb. 1996.
I think you are missing the point on this.
Take Kosovo for example. Several million people are fleeing their homes, driven out by tens of thousands of troops in small platoons. I suspect the situation would be very different if every household in Kosovo had a rifle, and the owner knew how to use it.
I seem to recall a war the US lost in vietnam where the enemy was armed with basic rifels, and whatever else they could get their hands on.
Also think about the current debate about sending ground troops to Kosovo. The US Government knows that it will take casualties if it gets into a ground war. Why? Because you can not take control of an area with tanks alone. Foot soldiers with rifels are needed. Foot soldiers would be shot at and some will die. Thus, small arms are effective, even against the largest and best armed military in the world.
However, despite all this, I'm probably one of the most normal kids you'll ever meet. I do well enough in school, contribute to the community, and am politically active. The idea of bringing a gun to school is utterly foreign to me. And yet you would think, judging by my hobbies and personality traits, that I would have flown off the handle long ago.
It just goes to show, Ted Turner is a three-headed monkey.
Dude, I was tormented all throughout middle school and most of high school. I was a nerd. I dealt with it. If you can't deal with a little bit of emotional anguish for four piddly little years, you need thicker skin. After highschool is over (and probably before highschool is over) the true, real pecking order of society is established. Nerds come out on top; they go to good schools and end up making more money than the star quarterback in highschool.
BTW, that girl on CNN should be locked up. It wasn't in the video, but she threatened the tormentors with violence as well.
Can anybody tell me of another country where people so regularly die in a hail of gunfire at school as they do in the USA ?
There isn't one. Kids in Belgrade and Baghdad are safer at school than kids in Belmont.
As long as the American government is stupid enough to let every man and his dog have a gun kids will continue to die at school.
So either get used to kids dying in increasing numbers or do something about the world's most stupid gun laws. We're not talking rocket science here folks.
also the most stupid. The "right to bear arms" is an out-of-date anacronism. The fact that a suave, tough-guy actor is head of the NRA speaks volumes about the USA as a whole.
The only people that can fix it don't seem to be interested in doing so.
"protect your kids so much"
You know it's ideas like this that is at the root of the problem. When you "protect your kids" what are you really doing? Keeping them from idea. Right? Now sometime, somewhere, somehow they won;t be "protected" anymore. Whatever showed them this, thought the idea. They are not your idea and not your feeling. You didn;t tell them why it was wrong you proable never ever told them about it. So you send them out into the world to learn for them selves. You know what happen when a kid learn for them selves?? Well 99.99999999% of the time they get it wrong. They think it's right. My dad thought me about firearms when i was 4. Showed me that death was forever. I understood what death was. I understood what pain was. The main problem on why you have 99% of the major problems in the world today is not becuase what is being sold at media play or shown on tv. It becuase kids are growing up not knowning basic values.
And things are being "protected" from kids.
Your job a a prerent is to show the world to your kids and express your values on them. Not to protect them and let them make up thier own values.
I understand fully why these kids did what they did and i wonder why more people don't do it. And personly i woouldn't mind if more people would die there are far to many living meaning less life.
To the next shooter...
Find me and pop a cap in my ass, please
>BTW, that girl on CNN should be locked up. It
>wasn't in the video, but she threatened the
>tormentors with violence as well.
yeah, right. And you know this because you were the cameraman? Bullshit.
The woman clearly stated that she hated her tormentors, but she never threatened violence. She said she had to suppress her anger..
BTW, to respond to your comments about "pecking order".. Yeah, I went to a good school, but ever since then, I've had the misfortune to have a long succession of jocks and ex-military as bosses. They didn't get there because they were smart, but because they all cover each other's asses and help each other out in the climb to the top. One of these assholes threatened to break my legs if I didn't help him cover up his embezzling by cooking the books. I blew the whistle on him to his partners. They couldn't get the money back (he already spent it), so they covered it up and told him he better not do that again. Then *I* got fired. Typical.
On an related note, there was a rally today in front of the local high-school. About 200 students walked out of class in protest of a new school policy. The school administrators have been interrogating students who have been arrested by local police. The police are required to inform the school of any infractions. The school says they ask the students what happened, and then tell their parents. Don't they think these students have ALREADY had to face their parents? The parents are protesting that the school has no right to interrogate or discipline their children for offenses committed off-campus. Of course, the school has a right to know who got arrested, but that doesn't give them any rights to interfere in how the family has already decided how to handle the matter. But the most telling remark came on the local TV news. They showed the protest, comments from students and parents, and then, last of all, some comments from a group of jocks wearing their school football tshirts. They all said "Those protesters are all just a bunch of troublemakers. They're the ones who got arrested!" Yeah, so what. Everyone has civil rights. The only reason the jocks haven't been interrogated themselves is that they have a "get out of jail free card." The local police has a policy of letting jocks off of most misdemeanors without even arresting them. This town is sports crazy. I know local jocks who have been stopped for drunk driving and the cops DRIVE THEM HOME to avoid causing a scandal. Fuck that shit!
What do these two things have in common?
Lack of trust.. A lot of problems in our country
revolve around mutual trust.. Some people
divorce their spouses because they "suspect"
relationships.. Well if you suspect anything,
you might just get it.. But if you can't trust them,
why get married? Simmilarly, if you cannot trust
your kids, how can you say you love them?
They have a right to privacy.. They will become great or bad, no mater what you suspect.. The best thing
to do is try to love them and trust that they can make the right decisions..
I too frequently find Katz's style difficult. Thing is: I usually at
/. record. As I write this, the number is
least take a quick look and, if I find a column uninteresting, I simply
stop reading and move on.
With regards to this specific column: it looks to me like the follow-up
responses may well set a new
up to about 950. I gather from this that the column touched some
nerves and stimulated fairly intense debate. (Well, *some* of it
qualifies as debate.)
So whether you feel that Katz has "added anything" to the wider debate
or not, you cannot argue that at least the mere posting of the column
wasn't useful.
Who knows: maybe some of the people debating their points-of-view will
actually learn something new and thereby enrich their minds?
If the vote were held again today, and in spite of the fact that I find
few of Katz's columns interesting, I'd vote again to "keep him."
> I think the framers of the Constitution simply couldn't comprehend
.223
> what some laws might come to mean in the future. I would seriously
> doubt they would have advocated regular citizens owning enough
> firepower to blow up a school. Remember what a gun meant in those days,
> a musket, with a reloading time of what, a minute or two?
I do not mean this insultingly, but you would do well to research an
issue before making such assertions. Your statement above is
reflective of many "anti-gun" arguments in that it is based, not on
facts, but sheerly on opinion. And it's completely incorrect.
But before I address the issue of what the Founding Fathers
"comprehended", I'd like to digress for a moment regarding one
particular part of your statement, that of "regular citizens owning
enough firepower to blow up a school."
You will find the vast majority of pro-gun rights advocates arguing,
not for mass-destructive firepower (such as bombs, missiles, and
nuclear weapons), but for for the right to keep and bear arms for
*personal* *defense*. And from a practical standpoint, your "weapons
of mass destruction" is a straw-man argument anyway. The weapons that
those deranged "children" had that were capable of "[blowing] up a
school" were fabricated from commonly available items such as propane
tanks. The most Draconian of firearms laws would not protect against
such as these.
On to my main point: that of the context in which the Founding Fathers
drafted the Second Amendment. The following article argues this far
more effectively than anything I could compose.
Ironically, the venue was Denver, CO.
---------------------- begin included text ----------------------
[Contributed by: dcd@se.houston.geoquest.slb.com (Dan Day):]
[Note: may have been edited for line-length and spelling.]
### Excerpt from Suter EA, Morgan RE, Cottrol RJ, Johnson NJ,
### Reynolds GH, and Kates DB. "The Right to Keep and Bear
### Arms - A Primer for Physicians."
Those who would ban "assault weapons" commonly try to justify their
position claiming that "the Framers couldn't envision the firepower
of 'assault weapons.'" Analysis shows that those prohibitionists
are unjustified in that claim.
[snip]
What of "assault weapons"? Is such "firepower" utterly beyond the
Framers' vision?
In a precedent overturning the City of Denver's "assault weapon"
ban ordinance, Doctors for Integrity in Research & Public Policy's
amicus curiae brief to the Colorado State Supreme Court argued:
Much of the argument for the Ordinance in this Court, the court
below, and before the Denver City Council proceeds from false
premises: That military-style semi-automatic firearms are so deadly
as to be wholly different from the arms contemplated in the right
to arms guarantee [of the Colorado Constitution]. The falsity of
this is illustrated by hypothesizing a mob attack on a home in 1989
versus 1876 [the date of the Colorado Bill of Rights' guarantee of
the right to arms]. In 1876 the discharge of the (then common) 10
gauge double-barrel shotgun into the mob would kill not less, but
far more, than would die today from a military-style firearm like
those the Denver Ordinance... bans.
Assuming the 1989 victim managed to fire a 30 shot magazine of
rounds into the mob, that would produce less than half as many
missiles [and would take 28 more trigger pulls] as would the 1876
double-barrel 10 gauge shotgun loaded with slightly larger (.24
caliber) No. 4 buckshot. Given optimum 1876 medical care, mob
members who suffered a solid hit in an arm or leg had a substantial
chance of death; a penetrating wound of the upper torso would kill
more than 50%; a penetrating wound of the abdomen would kill more
than 95%. But among the 1989 mob (among those who survived to be
hospitalized): the death rate for those struck in an extremity
would be negligible; and less than 10% of those suffering torso
wounds would die. (Including deaths before hospitalization, the
death rate from military-style rifle wounds is c. 24% -- much lower
than wounds with modern hunting arms.)* (This calculation is based
on recent studies by Col. Martin Fackler, MD, an experienced battle
surgeon and internationally renowned authority on the wounding
potential of firearms....) Only 5 of 35 children and one adult
(Patrick Purdy) [in the 1989 Stockton school yard "assault weapon"
attack] shot died. By comparison: a) 21 children and adults died
out of 31 shot in the 1984 McDonald's massacre in which James
Huberty used a 12 gauge shotgun; b) seven adults died out of 11
shot with a 12 gauge shotgun in Sunnyvale, California by Richard
Farley on Feb. 16, 1988; and c) 13 adults died out of 21 shot with
a 12 gauge shotgun in Luxiol, France on July 12, 1989 by Christian
Dornier.
In sum, the chance of both being wounded and of death from a wound
was higher from a shotgun in 1876 than from an "assault weapon"
today. This difference reflects today's much better medical care,
but the conclusion remains: the weaponry the authors of [the
Colorado Constitution's right to arms] knew when they guaranteed
the right in 1876 was far more deadly than modern civilian
military-style semi-automatic firearms.
To apply the same argument to the federal right one must review
firearms available at the time of the Second Amendment's enactment,
1789. While the "assault rifle" of the Framers' day, the "Brown
Bess" musket, was designed for rapid fire, the massive dispersed
shot charge and consequent lethality of the blunderbuss makes it
our salient example. Captain George Smith's 1779 An Universal
Military Dictionary provides a definition of "blunderbuss":
BLUNDERBUSS, a well-known firearm, consisting of a wide, short,
but large bore capable of holding a number of musket or pistol
balls, very fit for doing great execution in a crowd, to make
good a narrow passage, door of a house, stair-case, or in
boarding a ship.[Peterson HL. "Did It Work?" American Rifleman.
February 1955: 20-23.]
A single trigger pull of 1789's blunderbuss "was designed to kill
or disable as many men as possible...." It was the seventeenth and
eighteenth century antecedent of coach guns, riot guns, and
"assault shotguns." It had a gaping muzzle to facilitate rapid
reloading while seated on a bouncing coach and could potentially
fire as many projectiles as two trigger pulls of 1876's 10 gauge
shotgun discussed above. So, at the time the Second Amendment was
enacted, the Framers, with the common blunderbuss in mind, could
most certainly have envisioned substantial firepower and great
lethality.
----------------------- end included text -----------------------
I suspect the Founding Fathers envisioned the future a lot more clearly than
you credit them.
Population density is what I am talking about.
Lotsa things have a following and strategy but
ain't art. So what? No one would give a fuck, except JK says:-
> Gaming is intensely creative, in some contexts -> - almost approaching a new art form.
Now - are you disputing that ol'JK doesn't take soak up our beloved slashdot with redundant brown-nose pieces like this?
> I m against the propogated thought in society that believes that we have
> the right to kill others when our rights are infringed upon.
Then I must assert that your argument is, in this particular respect, a
straw-man. Or at the very least an invalid generalization.
As with the anti-gun crusaders' assertion that all "gun nuts" are in
favour of individuals owning weapons of mass destruction, which is
completely baseless: the assertion that gun-rights advocates believe
that anybody ought to be able to murder anybody, at any time, whom they
feel to have violated their "rights" is also not the case.
To boil the pro-rights advocates' position down to their simplified
essentials: defenders of the RKBA wish to retain the right to *defend*
themselves, their loved ones, their community and, in some cases, their
property against those who would unjustly "appropriate" these to their
own ends.
Murder is *never* justified. The use of deadly force as a last resort
in defending what is yours is. Note particularly that I highly-
qualified this. The mere use of "deadly force" does not imply that
intentionally killing someone who intends trespass against one is
justified. Nor is "revenge killing." Justice is the purview of the
Courts. But the use of such force is justified in order to defend
oneself against assault. True, mortality may result, but that should
not be the intent. Secondly, the use of deadly force should be
employed only as a last resort.
I believe you will find that this is the philosophy held by the vast
majority of "gun nuts."
Sure, but take it to the other extreme; what if the other kids had been armed, and the two killers had to walk into school knowing that they were facing an honest-to-goodness firefight? Would they still have done it, or would they just have been better prepared? Maybe not. But if all the kids had been armed, any disagreement could lead to being shot rather than getting into a fistfight.
Adolf Hitler said the same thing about banning guns.
May I have a reference, please?
You know, Germany had a lot of guns, and most men were enscripted and so had access to them. They took over most of Europe, remember?
No other democracy that I know of have that right?
So that would mean, you get no respect from the outside world.
But you can't ban people.
The only people with guns in Yugoslovia are the government and the police; so, the ethnic cleansing they are using the guns for must be legal!?
You can't because the whole anti-gun agenda is centered around ignoring the truth, and is in fact afraid of the truth.
This sucks.
My point is not that there aren't guns which are better or worse for hunting, but that the "hunting" component of the argument for gun rights is, as gun control proponents recognize, a decoy.
I know why they did it. Why they killed. Because that could have been me. But most of you, thankfully, will never understand.
..." But mom wouldn't let me leave the room. The phone call went on for about 20 minutes. Whereupon she hung up and went right back to yelling at me.
Yes, high school was hell for me too. As it was for all of you. But my home life was thousands of times worse. It wasn't until years afterwards that I realized that it was not normal for high school or middle school children to be actively trying to kill themselves. To hold arsenic in their hand, or a knife at their arteries, and to want more than anything to die. To end the emotional pain that is being tortuously inflicted upon them by those whom they love the most. A pain that is so extreme that it can not be endured. And yet, to want to live. Even if only for one more day... One more hour... One more minute....
My parents were "social chameleons". They had significant psychological problems. As defined by the DSM III-R. This was not my diagnosis. It was determined by professionals that I consulted with later in my life.
But to meet my parents. To talk with them. Unless you were one of the top psychiatrists in the country, you wouldn't spot anything amiss.
One of my all to many painful memories is of my mother yelling at me. Yelling. The word doesn't begin to describe it. Enumerating my every mistake, failure, and shortcoming as a human being ever since I was born at high volume, in my face, with assorted shoves and slaps would be more appropriate. But I always considered it just yelling. Probably because it occurred so frequently. I don't recall what mom was yelling at me for. I could have killed someone. I could have left a dirty glass in the sink. The cause was irrelevant. Mom preferred verbal abuse. Using words to hurt. Violence was used, but only rarely. When I wasn't paying sufficient attention to her rants, or being sufficiently obsequious. Anyway, the phone rang. Mom stopped yelling, picked up the phone, and suddenly everything was perfect. "Everythings fine. How are you doing? What's new?
Do you understand how a child's mind works? I assumed, incorrectly, that everyone was like my parents. The only thing that kept me going was a single question that I could not answer. I could not figure out how the human species survived long enough to reproduce itself.
Even so, I still don't know how I made it through those two long tortuous decades. Near the end, I was in really bad shape. I needed over 18 hours of sleep a day. And the transfer of knowledge from short term to long term memory was significantly impaired, inhibiting learning. The human mind was not designed to repress memories. Certainly not two decades worth.
I was fortunate though, there, in the end. I was able to get into therapy. I've spend over 12 years in therapy. 11 years on psychopharmaceutics. And I've gotten better. It was not the easy route. But it was the only route that I could accept.
Don't pity me. For my time in hell, I have seen wonders that you will never comprehend. I have experienced a jump in intelligence from "bright" to "genius". Or perhaps higher. I have no way to test it. I can only guess by comparing myself against my classmates and coworkers. And I have a better understanding of how the human mind works than most psychologists. The ultimate hacker experience. I've been past the boundaries of sanity, taken apart my own mind, and put the pieces back together again.
I have to wonder, though... If I had taken the easy route. If I had chosen to die. Would I have let the people who had tortured me live?
And if I had chosen to kill myself, and just myself, would my parents have blamed themselves? No. They would have blamed the equivalents of doom, quake, the internet, my friends, and so on. Some would say that this is scapegoating. But the true word to describe this phenomena is DENIAL.
PS: For the record, if this were not an anonymous forum, I would not be sharing this. I fear the truth would limit my career. And, for the record, my parents are both professionals, doctors, in the medical industry.
666
This has got to be some kind of record!
I'm not a coward, just anonymous.
Oh, go bite yourself.
Having established my position, I now qualify it.
Hell, according to the New Testament, is a place for people who don't believe in Jesus and follow his message, whatever that is this week. Hence, since the victims were products of overindulgent suburban America, they probably weren't saved, and _they_'re all frying in hell with Matthew Shepard.
Sorry. Off topic.
But I don't like this worthless diversion of purpose being passed off as a legitimate point. It's not.
-gdrago
You forgot Gandi... I don't think he ever used a gun to prove his point or fight the local governement. But then he was probably a better politician that some redneck who thinks with his gun and is paranoid about the governement.
You're right--it doesn't give people the right to kill others.
But, I do not agree with being born to kill, etc. If we were born to kill we would have killed at young ages (I'm talking 2nd and 3rd grade and even before). I have never been much into religon. I will even go as far as to say I don't believe in god. So if I have never been taught the right way, why don't I kill people then? If people were born to kill then in the very beginning Adam and Eve would have killed one another.
To me it sounds as if your school is easier on you than many I've heard. Some schools might be better than the one I went to. If you have never been pushed to the point of suicidal then you don't know how it _really_ feels.
I believe these kids used Marilyn Manson, Rammstein, and Hitler to get more attention. I think that they were trying to send a message. That message was "school is hell". And it worked too. If these kids did not wear trenchcoats, talk about Hitler, etc. then the media would not have picked up on it as they did. It would not be as interesting to America. But, the problem is most of Americans believe its a gun problem, a music problem, a violent video game problem. They do anything to remove blame from the tradition of the school system.
These kids said the exact reason they killed--to get revenge. They did not say "Heil Hitler". If people have ever played DOOM and Quake they would also know they are both games about survival. You can't walk up to a living thing (alien, human-alien, etc.) and have them not shoot at you (even if you don't shoot at all, or even have a gun/ammo).
So if every man/woman is supposed to be equal in America, then why are kids taught that football players, cheerleaders, etc. are more equal than kids who enjoy math, science, etc.?
A little story. About 9th-10th grade there was a new kid in my class. He enjoyed class, wanted to fit in very badly and did not cause trouble. Regular popular kids messed with him constantly. One day one of the popular kids drew a swastika on his coat. A few years later he is wearing a trenchcoat and wearing Marilyn Manson shirts. If people said something offensive to him in the hall he got angry and sometimes used violence.
what you don't realize is that you are a fringe lunatic. you're not a rational person. you're fanatically obsessed with something silly. it's pathetic.
grow out of it, man. move on. get a life. get a job. do something with yourself! jesus christ, grow up already.
No it doesn't.
42
No the GNOME 1.0 has more than 1000 comments you fool.
there are lots and lots and lots and lots and lots /. for becomgin a stupid media whore.there are wars everywhere.. like in yugoslavia.
of dead people in yugoslavia. a hell of alot more
than 16. there were a million or so in rwanda. we never had a march at my school
about rwanda, or front page news. fuck
why is that 'better'
why are there 'conditions'
why is it 'different'
tell me?
why is it 'justified'
why is it 'right'? fuck you and your military bullshit, esp. all the free software the military uses to kill babies.
the thing is, absolutes are bashed as the thing that _destroys_ American society, not builds up.
Insane absolutist gibberish is dangerous. Read about the Renaissance. It didn't happen because of a bunch of fundamentalists goosestepping around and muttering.
It happened because after centuries of people like you being in charge, some people started thinking for themselves.
Relativism, in actuallity, claims that whatever anyone believes is right for _them_.
IF AND ONLY IF -- are you listening? -- IF AND ONLY IF they don't ram it down somebody else's throat. You, for example, are free to believe whatever crazy crap you want to, as long as you let me believe my own crazy crap in peace.
Incidentally, that concept of freedom and individual rights was one of the founding principles of this nation, and it is one of the things that made us great. Deal with it.
according to popular cultural belief, this act of genocide was morally right for these guys to preform.
Are you completely out of your mind? Leaving aside for a moment that the word "genocide" applies to this event no more than the word "bake sale", where is this "popular culture" you're babbling about? Look around this discussion. There are over a thousand posts, and there is not one single serious post here (there are a couple of infantile jokes, I'm sure) saying anything like what you claim. Watch the news. Is anybody in the media saying anything like that? No. Is anybody ANYWHERE saying anything even remotely like that? No. Nobody is saying that. Anywhere.
Where the hell did you even get that idea? Look, you belong to a religion which advocates killing people because they disagree with you. I, a well-educated Northeastern liberal, neither advocate nor tolerate murder. Okay? You're the guy who's into shooting people, not me.
THE WHOLE POINT of what is accurately termed "tolerance" is that it is not okay to fuck with people, much less kill them, just because you feel like it. Get it? No, you don't, do you? The point is that we all have the same rights in the eyes of the law and in the sight of God, and you have no right to go around imposing your shit (up to and including bullets) on others.
I urge you to pray for our society, our government, and our president.
I'm praying that all of you religious fanatic morons eventually run out of steam and get a life.
Anyone can complain about something that is bad, but most don't have the mental discipline to do anything about it.
What are YOU doing about it? Praying? And how exactly does that differ from "complaining"?
Oh, I get it.
Complaining goes like this: "This sucks!"
But PRAYER, on the other hand -- oh, there's a world of difference! It's like night and day! Here's how prayer goes:
"Dear Lord, this sucks!"
Relativism is . .
A fantasy-world straw man invented by right-wing lunatics to save them the hard work of arguing against ideas that make sense.
Your own "ideas" are an incoherent miasma of fear, credulity, bigotry, and superstition. You've got a right to them, but if you had any manners you'd keep them to yourself.
Better that than make sure everyone but criminals are helpless, with losing all remaining control of our government as a little bonus.
And what if the founding fathers were just a group of fu* idiots, that just had a bright idea about freedom of speech at one time ? Were they some kind of god or what ? People seem to speak of them as if they couldn't have made a mistake ! Hey, they were humans ! They did mistake in their life, and I think (personnal opinion) the the 2nd amendment is a mistake. I don't give a damn about those guys.
You don't think it was a crime to murder Mrs. Weaver in cold blood? To set dozens of nutballs' kids on fire?
The government is almost out of our control. We have civil forfeiture, gun bans, the CDA - you think the same people who casually, contemptuously violate the Constitution they swore to defend really give a shit about *criticism* from Joe Sixpack? The moment the militia types aren't a credible threat, there ends democracy in the US.
When our government is out of control, a vote of the form "please do what we say" is not going to have any effect. Every US citizen has inherited their rights from people who fought and died for them, and has a duty to draw a line and make clear no authority will ever be allowed to cross it.
But most of us are lazy, ignorant cowards, and that's come to be expected (I'm sure Patrick Henry would be locked up today), so we're doomed and deserve it.
A nuke leaves nothing but acres of poisonous rubble. I can't use it to defend myself or keep the local authorities honest.
So far, tests have usually become de facto bans. I think it's New York City where you must pass a class. There are only a few dozen slots per year, all of which are occupied by people with good connections to city officials. J. Random Citizen is not allowed to meet the requirement, no matter how competent and responsible he is.
Armed, non-helpless victims are the single biggest deterrent to crime, far more so than what little the police can do. At least that's what almost every robber who's been interviewed said. This is why nobody puts up "UNARMED" signs on their home or their back.
That's a cultural difference between the US and the EU. The "clear correlation between the availability of firearms and the rate of violence" is in fact negative - violent crime rates are much higher in states with strict gun laws, and drop when those laws are relaxed.
The people who should be advocating morality instead go psycho about sex, which is none of their business and instantly marginalizes anything of value they might have had to say.
I'll be coming over for a holiday in Miami later in the summer... how much ammo should I pack for a two week stay ?
And a fullly-automatic weapon belongs in the hands of a soldier facing a massive wave of attackers who are marching too close together, with another soldier to carry ammo belts. The reason nobody's gone on a killing spree with a machine gun even once in the last fifty years is they *suck* - you'll probably run out of bullets before you hit anything.
There should be guards - courts and airports have them. To require citizens to go somewhere and fail to defend them while forbidding them from defending themselves is just sickening. I'm glad I don't have a kid.
Since guns have been invented, the only practical way to stop psycho rampages is lots of armed non-psychos. While the police can't be everywhere, a responsible private citizen can be just as useful and often benefits from surprise. It also deters assaults and robberies, given how much safer US states without strict gun laws are.
And the United States was conceived as a free society, and some of us are still attached to the idea of inalienable rights, even as the country lurches toward being just another Western tyranny. Doesn't being a "subject" bother you?
Well, yeah, if you draw attention and fight alone, you're obviously fscked. Think of it as evolution in action.
And the authorities don't have enough tanks to put one on every street corner in the country. The trick is getting the masses to rise up at once when they realize the government is out of control, with enough small arms that they won't simply be put down like typical rioters.
Most of the Angry Whites[tm] have gotten nothing but screwed from being white. Everyone else gets all the quotas and sympathy, just because of a few rich old fscks who look like us yet don't give a damn about us.
It's pretty grim, but I think it's healthy for bullies and other potential assailants to realize that how they treat other people just might matter.
Just to point out a thought, not every one wants to "fit in". To fit in you most likely need to agree with the group. It wasn't untill late in my highschool years that I even wanted to be near the "jocks". Most of the time I was around people on the far opposite side of the spectrum. And it wasn't to be antisocial. I did not have the same values, beliefs, or goals as the jocks. What I had for me that people in rural, and small suburbs don't have was a large enough, and diverse enough student body to fit in with a crowd that was like me. In smaller populations there are fewer groups, and several are made of very few people. They will be deemed antisocial only due to the fact that there are few people to fit in with.
One of the truly sad results of the latest masacre is the supposedly newly cautious schools. The local news last night reported suspending some girls for the rest of the year when after being teased they threatened violence. I think the punishment was not inline with the actions of the girls, but there was no comment as to any punishment given to the girls tormenters! In my undegreed opinion is what truly creates these murderers. Punishment is handed out to those who have already been punished by their peers for being different, and rarely to those who torment others. If you are beat up from your peers, and those how have authority over you, what else do these young people think they have?
To make this very obvious conclusion, it is not the net, video games, nor the medai that creates killers. It isn't most likely the parents of the killers, but the childeren around them, the authorities above them, and the parents of the children who did not teach their children that the words they speak can cause emotional harm to the receipiant of the comments. We desperatly need to teach all children from a young age tolerance for others. Only through tolerating others who are different from us will we continue to thrive. To not teach tolerance will only lead to more killers.
The only think the net and the non news media is guilty of is showing our youth alternate ideas to the "norm". This is not a bad thing. What is bad is when the "normal", or "social" group of people feel they must osstracise those who do not wish to be the same as them.
Personally, I think the government is run by people who only care about themselves and their political careers. I've lost a lot of faith in them, and I can understand why our military is not meeting its inlisting quota (or whatever they call it).
Lets face it. We need another GREAT man (or woman) in office, somebody that will turn this country around, open eyes, and kick some (ego) ass.
As has been pointed out, good citizens could and did own cannon. They *were* the army, and I'm quite certain they would have been appalled at the notion their government would fester until, mistrusting the very citizens it allegedly represents, it demanded the exclusive right to control a standing army that vastly outgunned them.
You spew laughable and easyly disproved opinions ("a bat is better then a gun for defense", "there aren't more then a dozen or so burglaries in each major city"). You can't respond intelligently so you must resort of personal attacks.
My main point is:
People who don't know what they hell they are talking about should educate themselves before their get on their soapbox and demand the revocation of my rights.
Pry open your small closed mind, disregard your preconceived notions. Learn something about the objects you so viciously hate (ie, what a "choke" on a shotgun is, and the difference between "improved cylinder", "modified" and "extra full"). Study the relationship between violence, crime, socio-economics, and gun ownership.
Think for yourself for a change.
The other students called them the Trenchcoat Mafia, and then they adopted it themselves. The media can't exactly fix their nickname after the fact.
I don't know, I just came from a trip to England (I'm from America), and the Blacks and Whites mingle pretty nicely there. Actually, compared to what I've seen in parts of America (I've been all over), I was quite shocked.
I don't think gun control has anything to do with it. (Enjoying your Irish bombs over there?) But they must be doing something right. What is the problem in America and South Africa. To butcher a quote from Rodney King:
"Can't we all just get the fuck along?"
WHAT is the problem?
Even assuming I should buy into one of the many incompatible versions of Christianity on nothing more than they say-so of its prophets, infinite torture for finite misbehavior goes far beyond vengeance, much less justice. Any being that allows an eternal hell to exist is obviously evil.
Unequal distribution of wealth is thermodynamically unstable?
Dude, you got it all wrong.
Money is not Energy.
Time is money.
Raise the bar on Manson?
You're an idiot.
GWAR has been out-doing Manson for well over a decade.
Isn't it true that S. Africa has some of the strictest gun control laws in the world? This has led to some of the highest crime rates in the world because criminals are having a hey-day with the unarmed victims.
. . . you CAN force all of us to worship.
.")
You cannot force all of us to believe.
(Has something to do with that little "free will" thing He gave us - read about it, in Genesis. The first three words God said to Adam and Eve were: "You are free. .
Consider yourself fortunate that your countrymen have a well-deserved reputation for standing up for themselves.
Maybe you've noticed - our government has gone totally off the rails. We're sliding down into tyranny (dragging the rest of the world down with us), and we'd probably already be there if the BATF didn't need to carefully paint each fringe resistance group as lunatics and then shoot them.
If you want to reduce the commission of violent crimes, making them safer (for the criminal, who almost certainly has strength and viciousness advantages, and probably an illegal weapon as well) is a really lousy start.
No free society can just decide to kill everyone simply for holding an idea, no matter how stupid. We reserve that for people who are an imminent threat to others and can't otherwise be stopped. I'd like to reach through the monitor and strangle you (IMHO you're a far bigger threat to civilization than even they are), but you have no recourse since I'm not actually going to do it.
"Hate crime" is a steaming pile. Crimes are crimes, and the judicial system shouldn't maintain a list of officially sanctioned motives that are treated less severely.
Sure it's no excuse. Sure it wasn't right. You tell it to the two gunners and see how much good it does.
In their tortured minds, it wasn't an excuse, it was an escape.
The people who DID the teasing just can't bring their tiny little minds to understand that, because they haven't been there. They don't know.
It may not be right, but it WAS the cause.
Very well put. I believe much of the reason these shootings happen in rural areas is because the schools are usually smaller. There are not as many outcasted people to hang-out with as there would be in a larger school.
My belief is this: these kids had a message. They planned this a year ago. Instead of just committing suicide they decided they would try to let the world know how they felt about school and what its really like. By mass killing they were sure to get the media's attention where as a suicide (even double) would have just made frontpage on their local newspaper. Their "tool" or "messenger" was, unfortunately, guns and pipebombs. Most of the people want to get rid of the "messenger". This is ignoring the issue completely. Sure, guns can be very bad. What about bombs? They are already illegal. I have not heard one thing about banning pipebombs. Guns this, guns that. I think its time America stops trying to hold on to tradition and makes changes to the school system. So what if the school system your child goes to is not like the one you went to? The one today is probably not much like the one you went to either. And its changing everyday (kids are getting more violent, etc.).
These two kids were outcasts, arguably nerds. Their ostracism was probably part of the motive for their attack, which makes it news-for-nerds. Can you find nerd-specific relevance in the Kosovars' ordeal?
We've backslid. In the 1700s, people knew freedom was worth fighting and dying for, they didn't take it for granted and would certainly notice if it were being eliminated.
Or to stop a bigger person who wants to kill them.
"Those who beat their swords into plowshares will be forced to plow for those who don't."
With guns, the smart have a good chance. Without them, the strong and brutal will always win. Even if you could un-invent the gun, which you can't, we're better off when attackers and victims are closer to equal.
Is that the same study that counted 25-year old drug dealers murdered by rivals as "children shot by a friend or acquaintance"?
If your assailant has a gun, there's a good chance he won't shoot unless provoked (draws a lot of attention and risks a murder rap), while with a knife, he must control you from hand-to-hand range and may cripple you just to keep you from fighting back.
Many locales ban porn that "portrays" children, even when all the people featured are in fact adults. Thoughtcrime, pure and simple.
Despite all this attention, those Belmont kids are in a lot more danger in a car than in school. If you want to let the religious fascists take over our country, at least be clear on how little you're really accomplishing.
Hell yes. If he doesn't flee, he clearly intends to do me harm (probably in order to rob me). I'd heard some people don't believe they should have the right to defend themselves, but it's still astonishing to see.
Then whatever they have will probably be much more effective than what I have (even if it's just their fists), and I'm helpless.
Besides, some of us are still attached to having some control over our government, even though that battle is currently being lost....
Usually when people want a great man to change everything, they get Hitler, Staline or Mussolini... her, it's always when people loose faith in their present politician that they elect a nice dictator that comes with ideas such as "no tax, gun for everyone, prayer in school, national proudness, etc...".
The truth is : politic is complex, and doing what you want to do there is difficult ! Unless of course you take over all the power... the reason why politician are so "inactive" is because they have to respect all those laws. Dictator don't have this problem of course, but do you want a dictator just to have lower tax ?
Also, let's not forget the multitude of serial killers and other lunatics who use "the devil made me do it" as an excuse for their actions. Or how about children who are beaten constantly by their parents because they believe their children to be sinful?
And if I recall correctly, God killed a hell of a lot more people in the Bible than the Devil ever did.
D. Vena
http://www.vena.net
Violence will come out if it is in the person. In some form or another it will be acted upon. Just because they can't find a gun doesn't mean they can't find a knife. If they didn't kill now, they would most likely have killed later, abused their wives and children, or something else. Blame the actions of an individual on anything but that individual and you are removing the root of the problem.
But perhaps your psyche cannot handle the responsability that would bring about. People responsible for their own actions? A gastly thought!
D. Vena
http://www.vena.net
to be exact.
Shall we go for 1095??
Oh, shut the hell up. You have no idea what you're talking about.
why not?
Yeah, and after all the gun nuts kill each other (should take more than a decade) we can re-claim the vacate land for better use.
Re: Do you think that your government will manage to bypass all other checks placed upon its legislation and functioning, and become so psychotically out of control that the people of the USA will be motivated to rise up as a militia and usurp them?
Now? No. 10 Years? 20? Maybe. What mystical force about the USA would prevent the very same things from happening here that happen all over the world? If first we argue "We don't need to take steps to ensure the government's power is in check, because our government would never do that," then, when the government becomes the sort of government that would, it's too late. We've then already given up our freedom in the name of security.
In a slight digression, recall from WWII, not so long ago: Newspaper ads in American papers taken out by British subjects, pleading 'Send us your personal arms so we may defend our homes from the Germans.' We didn't win WWII by much, people.
eom
...doesn't know anything about gun laws or guns. So he can speak from a position of complete ignorance.
Because the tragedy in Littleton and way too many other places, coupled with the continued stranglehold of the NRA, I want to move beyond the polarization towards a real solution.
I am so tired of arguments that people SHOULD be responsible for how they use guns and that the Second Amendment (predicated on preserving a "well regulated militia" in the US during the 18th century), gives gun enthusiasts, hunters and others rights to own guns a greater priority than the right of all of us to live on safe streets. But I want everyone to be well protected. This does not necessarily represent a permanent impasse!
I do not think that daily episodes of kids getting their hearts ripped open by bullets compare with the right to participate in some macho ritual to bring home a deer carcass to be mounted.
Of course ~99% of gun owners are responsible and not violent it is that other 1-% that spoils it for everyone.
However there is a legitimate need for self-defense. Hopefully people can be a little more creative in our thinking on this planet and support scientific efforts on par with the Apollo moon project and provide a truly effective long-range stun-gun that would sufficiently immobilize an attacker.
So in that scenario, after all those who wish to be (and are trained) are armed to the hilt with extremely powerful stun weapons (perhaps causing unconsciousness for 3 minutes) they then would be obliged as a patriotic duty and under law to have the truly barbaric flesh-tearing and metal-spitting weapons turned in for compensation. We should also maintain heavy penalties to discourage frivolous use of such stun weapons upon others (perhaps 5 to 40 years depending on the situation). Perhaps it is not very romantic to hunt animals with a stun gun but try talking to school children with shrapnel swimming in their brain.
I am not saying that this sort of world would be some sort of utopia, it would merely be an incremental step in the right direction. Yes, if someone is stunned they could later be stabbed or otherwise killed but this takes time and time is the enemy of the attacker -especially in a drive-by shooting scenario. Yes, there will be black markets for guns but there will also be enhanced technology for detecting them and an immediate cessation of bullet production and importation. The best benefit may not be for 50 years but for every 1,000,000 guns taken out of commission there would most certainly be a decrease of fatalities.
This is not something out of science fiction -this is doable. We must separate the logic of self-defense from that of the perceived need of ownership of a particular type of barbaric instrument. This would be for the greater good and people could still protect themselves. People have had a chance to be responsible for bullet releasing weapons and have failed to a sickening degree. This IS a realistic, humane alternative for the greater good. My ideas will sound less and less fanciful as the years pass, the technology improves and the death-toll mounts. As there is now no practical way to weed out all those who are future murderers the innocent must suffer the loss of a hobby. I appeal to the less hard-core of the gun enthusiasts to consider this sacrifice and this line of thinking for the sake of the children.
Let us hope that reason and science finally triumphs because our half-hearted laws certainly have not.
Dean S.
NY, NY
Ok, so I can't spell, but my heart is in the right place:)
I meant to say (Improve Stun Guns and then Trash the 2nd Ammendment)
Dean S.
NY, NY
In high school, I was a goth. People feared me because I was a goth. I did not have friends because of this. It's never bothered me, and it never occured to me until this whole incident happened, I was very lucky. I didn't mind being outside of the rest of the groups and cliques and everything else. I was never tortured, just alone.
Goddess
Why do you think the trenchcoat mafia crap came from.
My father (no, I'm not a kid. I'm closer to 30.) showed me a newspaper article. One of the people who was interviewed mentioned that. It seems a couple of the original TCM kids (not the shooters) got trenchcoats for christmas. The athletes coined the term as yet another way of making fun of them.
Don't forget that a parent who sues the school for something has a couple of other problems. First of all, any money they win comes from the school district. This will either result in higher taxes or less spending on the schools. This directly affects them. Second, their friends and neighbors also realize this and won't be happy with them over it in most cases.
I don't care what anyone says, it's not the music that over takes the mind to kill. Sure 1 out of 3 people listen to depressing music, but that doesn't make them a killer.
The music factor is bullshit, I listen to nirvana and Hole and Marilyn but i don't want to go and kill people.
I mean sure, i hate people but I have a reason to, like many others.
Everyone is blameing the music for the massicar in which Dylan and Eric committed.
People minds are already screwed-up, maybe because of emotional trama or physical abuse from others, and when you have an idea like 'killing' and someone gets to you and annoys you and hurts you, revenge sets in.
Music has nothing to do with it. It's the people with something wrong with them in their head, Not the music.
It is sad to think that people are going to ban music because they think it is linked with 'murder'. What kind of world would we have?
I think people should think about it before they say 'Music is the cause of murder'
- I have said my piece.
Perhaps the most shocking thing about massacres like Littleton is that, for all of the massive amounts of coverage brought to bear on them, there really isn't anything approaching a consensus about why they occur.
This also sadly illustrates one of the hardest things about being a journalist during such an event: they HAVE to prepare a story, but there is no way any real information is going to come out after only 48 hours and the officials investigating can only give out so much information.
What we get are "educated guesses" and "it's obvious that..." and other pseudo-authoritative bull -- not real news.
Not to take the subject lightly, but if I recall correctly, in the 1980's we had post offices being shooting galleries by disgruntled employees, in the 1990's we are seeing schools becoming ground zero by disturbed students. In the 2000's, why not make it more convenient by having disgruntled news reporters turn their television studios into bloody war zones (look... we're LIVE!).
Don't get me wrong; I feel bad for the friends and relatives of the victims of this recent event -- those that were shot, and those that were terrorized while it was happening, and as a parent, I would myself be traumatized if it happened to my children. But I do take offense to the media feeding frenzy that is going on in Colorado (interesting side light: less news about Jon Bonet).
First off, I am appalled to hear that the one 14yr old parents forced their child to show them personal information. No wonder kids hide things so well from everyone if they are forced like this to show things.
;-) but they didn't cause. Those kids were obviously emotianlly disturbed and had psychological problems. While we're at it, since games are bad, and tv is bad, and the Internet is absolutely evil, why don't we ban some books again? A Catcher in the Rye. Get rid of that, oh wow, can't have kids reading this kind of stuff! Why don't we also get rid of most of the other high school cirruculum books too? Romeo and Juliet? Promotes suicide. This is such an old and pointless argument. The fact is, the US government, and so many people in power, evidentily, are too lazy to do anything about the real problems.
Second, gun control in the US *doesn't work*. Those kids having guns was *illegal* already. They were illegal guns, they didn't go and try to buy them at the local gun shop. Maybe if the government actually enforced a few of their laws these types of things would be problems. Why is drug use and gun violence so prevelant in the US? Because the goverment isn't doing anything about it. They simply aren't enforcing the laws.
Third, I honestly don't believe that computers or TV or trenchcoats cause any of this. Maybe they contribute (all but the trenchcoats
Perhaps these kids were disturbed to begin with. Or perhaps, like so many other kids, they were routinely picked on, abused, and violated at school. Maybe the "jocks" were beating the hell out of them, stealing their things, and humiliating them on a daily basis. And just perhaps, the teachers/administrators, didn't do anything about it. Just like everywhere else. Can't have the star quarterback suspended, you know. Oh, he couldn't do anything wrong, you must have provoked him.
Is it such a surprise that kids subjected to this snap? Emotional problems + physical and mental abuse = psychological instability?
Eliminate the problem, stop the result. This was a terrible thing, but it will happen again if you don't get rid of the actual cause. (hHnt: it isn't the Internet or trenchcoats)
> The biggest reason for this tragedy are the gun laws.
I knew this would come up soon. Let's see... item number... three. That
didn't take long.
First let us dispel some myths.
Even with higher-calibre handguns, mortality from gunshot wounds is
surprisingly low. Last I looked, I believe the number is something like less
than 25% of all shootings. *All* shootings. Including shootings by trained
law-enforcement officers. A handgun is simply a very in-effective "assault
weapon." Handguns are *defensive* weapons in nature.
Next: those "children" shouldn't have had access to firearms of *any* kind
without adult supervision. *Including* long guns. (Rifles, shotguns.) As a
matter-of-fact, it is against the law in most (all?) states for minors to
carry a handgun except for hunting or target shooting purposes. And then
only under adult supervision. The law already covered them.
You'd ban handguns (which are notoriously ineffective as assault weapons),
but you'd allow the continued availability of rifles and shotguns, would
you? Do you have any idea whatsoever of how easy it is to convert a rifle to
a pistol-like form-factor? Got a hacksaw? Do you know that home-defense
experts recommend that even those experienced with handguns are better-off
with a shotgun for home defense than a handgun? Yep. And part of the reason
is because they are so much more effective in a close-range, combat
situation. Try this: find a friend that has both handguns and a shotgun,
take some cardboard out someplace safe (and *legal*!) to do this, and shoot a
large-bore handgun round through the cardboard, then a load of double-ought
buck. (And let's not hear any arguments about "expanding" handgun rounds.
Such expansion is quite unreliable.) After you've done the experiment, get
back to us and let us know which weapon *you* would rather face.
Then there's the fallacy underlying your "ban the handguns but long guns are
okay" proposal. It's the same argument that the anti-gun types in the U.K.
used. But once handguns were eliminated as a "threat", then rifles were "the
problem." And once rifles were "taken care of", then the shotguns were
likewise restricted. Our British cousins have neatly slid all the way down
that "mythical" slippery slope to complete disarmament of the population.
Imagine that.
Even valued, and *valuable*, old collectors items were forced to be rendered
inoperable. Never mind that doing so completely destroyed their value as
collectors items. And never mind the loss in investment that their owners
were forced to endure.
Now on the the supposed effect of the availability of firearms, of any type,
on a situation like Columbine.
You didn't happen to notice, did you, that *bombs* were prominently mentioned
in (nearly?) every news story about that tragedy, did you? You didn't happen
to notice that preliminary reports indicated the likelihood that many of the
injuries and deaths may have resulted from *shrapnel* wounds, did you? If
not, now you know.
And did you happen to catch those items about the *propane* bombs? Do you
have any idea whatsoever the damage, both in terms of property and human
misery, of which such a device is capable? Here's a hint: many years ago,
while I was in Europe, a propane tanker exploded off the coast of Spain (as I
recall). Quite some ways off the coast. I will never forget for the rest of
my life the pictures in the papers of people burned beyond recognition,
literally welded to the beach chairs they had been sitting in, with the ashen
remains of books or whatever they might have been reading at the time still
between what was left of their hands. It was a disaster of horrific
proportions. They never knew what hit them.
The amount of stored energy in even a small tank of propane is tremendous.
This is why restrictions on firearms, ammunition, fertilizer, manure (yes,
this has been discussed) are a complete waste of time. Are you going to also
restrict the sale of, or register, gasoline? Propane? LNG? And the
hundreds of other chemicals which, alone or in combination with others, are
capable of inflicting horrendous damage?
It's long past time that the American public became educated about these
issues and the left-wing liberal gun-grabbers stopped lying to them. Then
maybe we can open an honest dialog that may actually lead to a solution that
has a chance of ending the carnage.
I Am,
Jim Seymour
jseymour@jimsun.LinxNet.com
"More relevant questions might be: Why are so many of these killers male and middle-class, rather than the poor or the underclass? Why do these assaults occur almost exclusively in rural or suburban areas? Why are these kids able to hide even severe emotional disturbance from the people closest to them? "
I think those words should bring some insight to the problem. The media will make an obvious connection to Video Games and the Internet, but those reasons alone don't cause people to massacre their peers.
There was genuine hate that ran through the minds of the gunmen. They intentionally targeted Jocks for what reason? Do we think it is because they were Jock-haters? If they were violence crazy, why didn't they go to a shopping mall where the killing would have been easier, or a grocery store, why their school?
The truth is, there has to be a story behind it. From what I saw on CNN last night, the gunmen were abused mentally and physically while at school. They were outcasts, they were pushed around - and nobody stood to help them. These kids were pushed to far, and that is the bulk of the reason it happened.
I pose one question - why do we not here about things like this in Asia or Europe, why here in the US? I contribute the rise of cliques and the concept of being "the most cool guy in school" as primary problem. To my knowledge, this does not happen in Europe. People are not picked on because they don't fit in (please stand and correct me if I am wrong anybody...I'm generalizing very large). You have to fit in, you have to become one of them. Its childish that we seperate ourselves onto those levels.
When I was in high school (in a middle size town of middle class too), it was how nice a car you had. Its true, if you didn't have a SUV or a BMW, then you couldn't be in the "popular" clique. Though I didn't follow this concept, and perhaps a few people branded me as an outcast, little did I care what they thought.
But that is my mentality. There is was so much pressure to be this popular hero, and that is most certainly what happened in Littleton - and the gunmen snapped. They didn't fit in, they were picked on, and they thought they were doing the only thing they could to extract revenge on their entire school.
What they did was certainly wrong. But at the same time, those who provoked these students must carry some of burden of the massacre - it is their fault too. When you go as low as physically abusing somebody because they don't fit in - to me there are few things lower than that.
Sadly, I don't see an end to the problem I have vaguely described. So what can we do about it? I don't have answers, just more questions.
simon
have seen on the subject since it happened, although many of the
Here's my critical disagreement which other posters have noted as well:
- "They've been generally described as well-parented." Excuse me, but I don't think so!
While a certain amount of freedom is important during the teenage years, if parent's aren't involved in demonstrable understanding of their child's state of mind, then in my book, the child isn't "well parented."An example. In Jr. and Sr. high school (middle '70's) I saw severely emotionally disturbed kids, often with the same "kill all
It didn't occur to me until late in my 20s, that although I had relatively good parents, neither of them ever lifted a finger or said a word to me about how I was feeling, etc. A good deal of the time the answer would have been "absolutely horrible. I don't know how to connect and be involved with people." [Similar to thoughts Jon expressed in his "Running to the Mountain" book, by the way.] Secondarily, I might have asked them how I could have befriend these outcasts, because I knew exactly how they angry and alone they felt. Perhaps the one difference was that I just didn't want other people to have to feel the same way I did, so in my own awkward ways I reached out, and if nothing else, had friends because I worked so hard to be a friend.
Now that I'm a parent, this kind of involvement has become my primary definition of "good parenting." My kids can think anything they want about their fuddy duddy daddy, but at least they know that I notice how they feel, and am willing to do something to help - even without the right answers all the time.
Just being there willing to listen is 1/2 of the answer most kids need anyway, don't you think?
Do you honestly believe these kids
would have killed *13* people without
the use of guns?
No. They would have likely eventually
grown out of whatever adolescent "phase"
they were going through, and carried on
with their lives.
They might have gotten into some trouble
with whatever violent tendencies plaguing
them, but they would simply not have killed
13 people.
Yes, people kill, not guns, but guns make
it *very easy* to kill LOTS of people for
those inclined.
(just look at the NRA scaling back their
little meeting coming up in Denver. *They*
know what the story is...)
I am leaving South Africa. My home and my friends are here, but I am terrified. I know I shall be in trouble for saying so, because I am the widow of Alan Paton.
Fifty years ago he wrote Cry, The Beloved Country. He was an unknown schoolmaster and it was his first book, but it became a bestseller overnight. It was eventually translated into more than 20 languages and became a set book in schools all over the world. It has sold more than 15 million copies and still sells 100,000 copies a year.
As a result of the startling success of this book, my husband became famous for his impassioned speeches and writings, which brought to the notice of the world the suffering of the black man under apartheid.
He campaigned for Nelson Mandela's release from prison and he worked all his life for black majority rule. He was incredibly hopeful about the new South Africa that would follow the end of apartheid, but he died in 1988, aged 85. I was so sorry he did not witness the euphoria and love at the time of the election in 1994.
But I am glad he is not alive now. He would have been so distressed to see what has happened to his beloved country. I love this country with a passion, but I cannot live here any more. I can no longer live slung about with panic buttons and gear locks. I am tired of driving with my car windows closed and the doors locked, tired of being afraid of stopping at red lights. I am tired of being constantly on the alert, having that sudden frisson of fear at the sight of a shadow by the gate, of a group of youths approaching - although nine times out of 10 they are innocent of harmful intent. Such is the suspicion that dogs us all.
Among my friends and the friends of my friends, I know of nine people who have been murdered in the past four years. An old friend, an elderly lady, was raped and murdered by someone who broke into her home for no reason at all; another was shot at a garage. We have a saying, "Don't fire the gardener", because of the belief that it is so often an inside job - the gardener who comes back and does you in.
All this may sound like paranoia, but it is not without reason. I have been hijacked, mugged and terrorised. A few years ago my car was taken from me at gunpoint. I was forced into the passenger seat. I sat there frozen. But just as one man jumped into the back and the other fumbled with the starter I opened the door and ran away. To this day I do not know how I did this. But I got away, still clutching my handbag.
On May 1 last year I was mugged in my home at three in the afternoon. I used to live in a community of big houses with big grounds in the countryside. It's still beautiful and green, but the big houses have been knocked down and people have moved into fenced complexes like the one in which I now live. Mine is in the suburbs of Durban, but they're springing up everywhere.
That afternoon I came home and omitted to close the security door. I went upstairs to lie down. After a while I thought I'd heard a noise, perhaps a bird or something. Without a qualm I got up and went to the landing; outside was a man. I screamed and two other men appeared. I was seized by the throat and almost throttled; I could feel myself losing consciousness.
My mouth was bound with Sellotape and I was threatened with my own knife (Girl Guide issue from long ago) and told: "If you make a sound, you die." My hands were tied tightly behind my back and I was thrown into the guest room and the door was shut.ß They took all the electronic equipment they could find, except the computer. They also, of course, took the car.
A few weeks later my new car was locked up in my fenced carport when I was woken by its alarm in the early hours of the morning. The thieves had removed the radio, having cut through the padlocks in order to bypass the electric control on the gates. The last straw came a few weeks ago, shortly before my 71st birthday. I returned home in the middle of the afternoon and walked into my sitting room. Outside the window two men were breaking in. I retreated to the hall and pressed the panic alarm.
This time I had shut the front door on entering. By now I had become more cautious. Yet one of the men ran around the house, jumped over the fence and tried to batter down the front door. Meanwhile, his accomplice was breaking my sitting- room window with a hammer.
This took place while the sirens were shrieking, which was the frightening part. They kept coming, in broad daylight, while the alarm was going. They knew that there had to be a time lag of a few minutes before help arrived - enough time to dash off with the television and video recorder.
In fact, the front-door assailant was caught and taken off to the cells.ß Recently I telephoned to ask the magistrate when I would be called as a witness. She told me she had let him off for lack of evidence. She said that banging on my door was not an offence, and how could I prove that his intent was hostile?
I have been careless in the past - razor wire and electric gates give one a feeling of security. Or at least, they did. But I am careless no longer. No fence - be it electric or not no wall, no razor wire is really a deterrent to the determined intruder. Now my alarm is on all the time and my panic button hung round my neck. While some people say I have been unlucky, others say: "You are lucky not to have been raped or murdered." What kind of a society is this where one is considered "lucky" not to have been raped or murdered - yet?
A character in Cry, The Beloved Country says: "I have one great fear in my heart, that one day when they are turned to loving they will find we are turned to hating." And so it has come to pass. There is now more racial tension in this country than I have ever known. And it is black-on-white crime. The blacks are like rabid animals. So you see it an incurable problem and one that is not unique to America or South Africa, but to all places where blacks and whites are forced to mingle against their wills.
Newspapers, television, and other "news" outlets report on the growing need for increased security in schools, tougher gun control, and the banning of trench coats!
Regardless of how "well parented" the shooters at Littleton were supposed to be, their parents should be brought up on charges of neglect and contributing to the delinquency of a minor. You can't tell me a "good" parent wouldn't notice antisocial behavior and lowered self image from constantly being picked on at school. And work to make home the haven from the brutes (even home school!).
From Rob's polls, it's obvious that most readers of slashdot are students. Making the assumption that most students have yet to start a family - let me impart a piece of advice:
If you have kids, make sure you have the ability for at least one parent to be at home with them while they grow up.
Before you go off on a "he or she is a sexist" diatribe - I'm not advocating Mom stay home - I'm advocating either Mom or Dad stay home.
Do us all a favor; if you and your spouse think your careers are important, and neither can give them up for kids - don't have any! Yeah, you may not be able to buy a new Lexus every year, but if that's your priority, you shouldn't be polluting the gene pool with you family tree, anyway.
The reason why "no one" seems to know why the kids kill is because the real reason is extremely politically incorrect. There are very good reasons why the killers have been white and middle-class. Here it is:
We'll look first at these kids' parents. The kids appear to have been parented well, taught about right and wrong, and such. But these parents have a neurotic need to have a "normal whitebread family" like those 50's TV shows. These parents are your stereotypical "good parents". However, when their young child first go against their parents' neurosis, perhaps refusing to go along on a "family outing", the parent has to coerce the child into going along, because they can't bear to go against their neurosis. The parents beg and threaten, and the child goes along. After this happens several times, the child gets a quite distinct awareness of their parents' neurosis.
Fast forward to the beginning of kindergarten. The child is now thoroughly anti-authoritarian, and often refuses to obey the teachers. They may be classified as "difficult". They also have a compelling need to "fit in", instilled by their parents. However, they will fail at becoming socialized, because their need to fit in is so great that they will take everything too seriously, as their parents do. After a year of this, become your stereotypical "misfit".
Now fast forward to high school. Puberty has hit, and the parents now, consciously or unconsciously, stifle their child's sex drive. After all, sex is never discussed in a "normal family", right? The child is now old enough to talk rationally about philosophy and religion, which unnerves the parents to no end. It's not "normal", is it? If the parents are religious, the child would have rejected their religion by now. The child probably is chronically depressed, but the parents will not even consider that the child might be. "Normal" kids aren't depressed, are they?
At school, they have stopped trying to fit in. Maybe they wear black clothes and listen to "anti-social" music. Maybe not. But the "popular" students tease them unmercifully. Virtually everyone teases them. They may get into fights.
No human being can take that kind of stress for very long. They have to get rid of that stress somehow. They reason with their parents and with their classmates. They try everything else first. But remember, they are minors. They cannot go live on their own. They are coerced into going to school, and their parents refuse to homeschool them. So what happens when that stress, which has no means of release, gets high enough to override their prohibition against killing?
After the shooting, the parents will never know what went wrong. Their illusion was total.
Why is it that during the eighties the shootings occuring in Inner city schools was ignored, almost expected? Now, that violence is gaining momentem in Suburban communities we have a sudden convergence of media technology on it.
Teen violence is not caused by games or media or artwork or books. The root of Teen violence is a deep seated need to lash out to defend themselves against what they feel is a personal assault. These kids don't have the self esteem to accept themselves as they are. Instead, they lash out.
I've lived in the Atlanta area for the last 7 years, and year after year I see good middle and upper middle class kids getting hooked on drugs. Why? Their parents aren't engaged in their lives. They don't take the time to concern themselves with the need kids have to feel bonded to something permanent. They don't give kids the feelings of safety they crave so much.
The result, we are raising a generation of children who are trying to escape the "prison" they live in. They want to have fun, because mom and dad are boring. Well guess what Mom & Dad, get off your butts and take the kids camping. Spend time with them every day. Take an interest in what they do. Demand their time. They'll get used to it, they'll eventually appreciate the time they get from you. Above all, realize that if you kid delves into drugs or hangs with a bad element, it's YOUR responsibility to do something about it. It's YOUR FAULT if you don't and something untoward happens.
(This comment was written by a single parent of 5 years.)
Yes, a gun is just a tool. It is a tool that can be used to kill people. If there were no guns, there would be no shooting deaths.
Look at car accidents. If we banned cars, no-one would be killed in a car accident.
The reason that nobody suggests a ban on automobiles, is that they serve a useful purpose. Our society has come in many ways to depend on them, and though there is inherently some level of danger associated with them, society as a whole seems willing to accept that danger in return for the benefits we derive.
The situation with guns is very different. Society does not gain very much by having guns in all its citizen's hands. Guns are something that we could remove from the posession of private citizens without losing too much (yes, we lose some freedom.. but even preventing wanton murder is curtailing someone's freedom. It's not a black and white issue.. grow up.)
So the conclusion? Guns kill people. Cars kill people. Airplanes and lawnmowers and knives kill people. Guns we can do without. These other things we cannot without losing a lot. So get rid of guns..
You obviously stepped on this guys sensibilities -- I can kind or relate to your point of view though. My parents intrusion into my personal life incensed me; Never to physical violence, but deffinitely harsh words. Our relationship really improved when I moved out and started going to college.
Read Heinlein's 1953 Revolt in 2100, now more than ever.
Anonymous Cowards: Proving daily that human beings are innately jerks.
The United States of America will blow its self up
something like this would never happen in Canada, which is a much more sane country
Why the heck is everyone mentioning "DOOM"? The least they could do is go up the notch to Quake or Duke Nukem 3D.
Anyway, my opinion is that these guys were basically bored. They had some "spare cycles" in their heads, and ended up filling them with ideas about guns, bombs, and death. It's really not all that uncommon -- I know a lot of people that like guns, fire and explosions (dunno about death, tho). Guns are exciting. So is fire. So is destruction. That is why Quake sells.
The thing is that these guys crossed the line from mere idea to pure reality. It would be very difficult to know exactly what caused them to do that. Maybe drugs, maybe something else..
Wasn't it about two years ago when a man walked into an elementary school and killed several teachers?
Besides, when people don't have access to guns, they come up with different ways of killing. There have been plenty of bombs set off by the IRA in the UK..
I totally disagree. Parents should be there for their kids, yes, but that does not mean that the parents must give up their lives to their children. Both of my parents work, and I never felt like they didn't have enough time for me. I know plenty of much worse-adjusted children with stay-at-home parents who feel trapped by their parent's constant supervision.
More to the point, it is totally self-rightous to claim that parents that work are doing it only to "buy a new Lexus every year." Maybe the parents both work so that they can give their kids braces when their teeth are crooked, and health care when they get sick, or to put them through college at a good school. Maybe the parent is just doing it because they like the challenge of having a job. I really don't see why working and having children must be mutually exclusive, and I'm so sick of hearing it, because it is obviously not true. Parents have responsibilities to their children, but having children does not mean that one person in the household must give up everything for them.
As for the parents of these kids, I feel sympathy for them. I kinda doubt that they were the ones that drove these kids to doing what they did, and I'm sure that this has been a devastating event in their lives. Perhaps they DIDN'T do anything wrong. We certainly don't know that they did. Until I hear otherwise I am going to sympathize with, not blame, the parents, for I'm sure that they are having a terrible time of all of this mess.
However, the guns are what killed the people. The bombs produced a significant number of the injuries (shrapnel wounds mostly), but nearly all (all?) the fatalities were from gunshot wounds.
Disclaimer: I'm not necessarily in favor of banning guns - just clarifying things.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
In the overall scheme of things, why are we spending so much time and effort trying to understand and/or do something about school shootings? I have a better chance of being killed on the road driving to school than of being killed at school, yet the media never has prime-time in-depth coverage when kids are killed while driving to school.
What about 2 million+ people that died in Rwanda? There was relatively little (compared to this) media coverage of that incident. Is this media racism (Rwandans are not white), or is it apathy towards anything that doesn't happen in the United States?
What about the hundreds of kids killed in inner-cities? Is it racism again, since most of them are black, that nobody cares about them? Or is it because they live in poverty, while this was in a wealthy suburb, that makes it more important?
Basically, I want to know why these 15 deaths are given proportionally so much more attention than any other group of 15 deaths in the United States or anywhere else in the world.
Disclaimer: I am not trying to be callous saying "i don't care that these 15 kids died," I'm just wondering why we care that these 15 kids died but we don't care that hundreds of thousands of kids die in other places?
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Ok, I'll rephrase then:
The fact that the kids were in possession of firearms directly led to the killings.
I suppose I should've said the bullets are what actually killed them, since the gun merely fired the bullets.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
That's the distinction I don't get. I can see its interest for psychologists, but why does it really matter to the rest of us? The people are still dead, regarless of whether it was a fellow student or an outsider who killed them.
The hundreds of kids killed while driving to/from school every year are also dead, but nobody pays nearly as much attention to them.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Sounds like a good idea to me. Much better than banning trenchcoats or Marilyn Manson anyway.
However, can it continue past the media spotlight? Will the school continue doing these things? More importantly, will these cliques continue trying to understand each other after the initial shock of the event has faded, or will they go back to being intolerant of each other?
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Well, several gun manufacturers are being sued by some cities claiming their weapons are responsible for the cities' murders. That's somewhat like weapons being put on trial.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Posted by The Mongolian Barbecue:
Clearly the recent school killings are evidense of the y2k bug in the human OS. Don't spend new years eve with your back to your kids...
Posted by The Mongolian Barbecue:
I'm sorry you don't like my humor. However, if I held my tongue every time I thought someone _might possibly_ take offense, then I would never joke at all. Just because you've had a painful experience doesn't mean the rest of us need to tiptoe to avoid offending you. It is pretty arrogant of you to think you can shut everyone up on a subject just because it hurts you. The world is a callous place. So you grow up.
Posted by The Mongolian Barbecue:
but there is no hell... and no god either. isn't the universe a shithole?
Posted by MurphAndTheMagicTones:
Fully automatic weapons were outlawed back in 1986 or 1988
Maybe where you live, but not in the U.S. The BATF requires a background check, fingerprinting and a huge amount of cash. You then have a class III permit to own a full auto.
You can pick up a MAC-10, or an old full auto Uzi no problem.
I take you are speaking from experience. Please recount your story of how you were able to get one (and keep it without getting snagged by the cops).
Posted by Lord Kano-The Gangster Of Love:
>>Are you part of a well-regulated militia?
If he's between the ages of 18 and 45, and is a law abiding citizen, then yes. We are all the militia here. Not only is it our right, but is our duty.
Here in the US every male is REQUIRED to register with the government so that we can be drafted into the military. Why? Because as the militia it's our duty.
LK
Posted by Stephen "The Carp" Carpenter:
you mean like "A gun in the home is X times
more likelyto be used on a fammily member than
on an intruder"
Where "used" only counts shootings...and
suicides are counted (while they do fit the
profile of "on a fammily member"...they
scew the results...afterall suicide rates
do not drop in places with less guns...
just more self hangings and building jumps)
Posted by EntilZah:
/. that have had to put up with their fair share of put-downs or outcasting as a result of our interests at some point or another during our high school lives. I think it's safe to say that at least most of us didn't react in the way that has recently received so much attention. Is this because of the parenting we received? Is it because we just didn't want to? Is it because we have a higher regard for life? Is it because we vented our frustrations blowing up aliens and monsters? I don't know. I just know I made it through and a lot of others have too.
Those of us in the U.S. seem to make a recreation out of finding someone or something to blame for everything bad that happens (yes, it's a generalization, but it's true). Occassionally, we find the right person or thing to blame, but such incidents rarely find their place on international news. People in other countries seem to make a recreation out of pointing out what is wrong with the U.S. when those later incidents occur.
The media now provides an instant look into events as they occur or immediately after. Our first reaction to tragedy is "Why?" and in this world of instant feedback, we get a lot of answers. Unfortunately, you combine this with the previous point I mentioned, and you get a lot of blame really quickly where it doesn't belong.
I think there are probably a lot of us in this forum on
Regardless of parenting (but let me express I feel that is the most important factor in a child's development), there are large influences on a developing psyche from all over the place; including media, friends, peers, etc. These things all work together to provide a backdrop to the development of people. We can't look at just the parents' role, although I agree it seems to be somewhat lacking and that it must have played a significant part. We can't look at just the games they played, although the fact that they played those games may be an indicator that there're some emotions that need to be dealt with (but, maybe not). It's impossible to say.
A couple of posters on this forum have used the term "gun nuts" to, as far as I can tell, describe anyone in the U.S. who supports the second amendment and/or owns guns. So, apparently, I'm a gun nut now. But I haven't killed anyone. And if I did, I wouldn't use a gun. There's no creativity or challenge in it. Guns are tools. Like any tool, they can be misused. Just think, drunk drivers misuse their cars to kill people, but no one's calling for the banning of all cars.
Anyway, we as humans naturally tend to gather in groups of like-minded people. That's the whole basis for community. When something bad happens, we want to blame someone else for it. And because we can't find fault with our own beliefs, it must be something that someone from another group (game players, gun owners, trenchcoat wearers, etc.) that is to blame. Their thinking is wrong. And in order to protect themselves, those groups retaliate by finding someone else to blame and so on.
So, I ask you. Since I'm a gun owner who dresses in dark clothes often that enjoys playing violent video games AND that plays AD&D from time to time, whether or not I'm wearing my duster or trenchcoat, who do I get to blame when things go wrong? Which one is it? It's got to be someone else, because I've been taught by the media and the reaction of the people to bad things that people never do bad things just because they want to.
Posted by Stephen "The Carp" Carpenter:
No black market in the UK...remember...
Laws only affect those who respect the law.
I would bet that anyone in the UK could get their hands on guns like that if they have the money
and the connections (much like drugs)
Besides...if noone has guns...then the criminals
don't ned them either...they are perfectly
happy to stabb your unarmed ass to death
Posted by mudmonkey:
I own a house just a few minutes from Columbine high school, I play golf
and shop right by there so this has affected me (all of us here) quite
differently than the other incidents around the country. It is quite a
surrealistic site to see almost 3 million people go about their day in a
numbed daze (on April 21). When you see it on TV, you know it is real, you
know there are victims, but, it is on TV, it is sterile (much like you were
discussing with the electronic weapons we watch in Yugoslavia). When it is
a couple of miles away, all of a sudden, you feel the focus of the
television turned upon you. It is eery.
Back to your point regarding demonification of the suspect's interests. On
local television here, they quickly went into researching what they had
posted to the Internet and came up with a paragraph from Eric which
basically said he wanted everyone dead. It was disturbing in light of
what had happened, but, nothing that an immature, upset person wouldn't
spout out of anger. The television commentary was basically, "posting that
to the Internet is legal!?! How can that be!?!" They then went into great
discourse about how he had books about Doom. They were unaware that it was
a computer game and wondered how someone could write and publish a book
about Doom.
We see this in every event, we look for a cause, we blame the topic with
most interest or emotion, and then we shift our focus. Oklahoma City: I
recall the "anti-terrorist" laws that were passed which allowed agencies
previously disallowed to operate in the US (namely the CIA) access to
American soil. Why? In the name of protection they said. I fear we may
start seeing CDA III directed toward anything deemed terrorist in nature.
Lastly, why do we call these suspects kids? I realize they really are
kids, I think of 18 year olds as kids; however, when we stop and think
about it, they were 18. These are the same kids we may send into
Yugoslavia and ask to perform the same function (throwing bombs and
shooting). They are 18 year old kids in school, but 18 year old men on a
battlefield.
--Brian
Posted by Lord Kano-The Gangster Of Love:
>> How come the armed guard in Colorado didn't stop the killings...Stating that guns prevent crime really misunderstands the nature of most gun deaths, dramitic example like this aside.
He didn't stop it because he wasn't a good enough shot.
Guns DO prevent crime. Gary Kleck's research has shown that Americans thwart 2.5 million crimes with guns each year.
>>To continue that logic to today we should all own anti-tank weapons and SAMs, simply put there is no way for a civilian to be even near on par with a government troop in the era of modern warfare, how effective have the armed militia groups been when they get in to conflicts with the government, regardless of your opinion of them, I can't think of a single government agent being killed...
Then you are woefully underinformed in this area. In Waco Texas 4 government agents were killed by the Branch Davidians. On Ruby Ridge in Idaho, Kevin Harris killed agent William Degan with one shot. Even if he'd been wearing a kevlar vest, he still would have died.
He was shot with a 30-06 rifle from a few dozen yards away.
>> I know of few that are arguing that the right to bear arms should be repealed....I know many who think that it should be more regulated. It is currently easier to get a gun than it is a drivers license....gee, that makes sense.
When the US constitution is amended to include a right to "keep and drive cars" then maybe it should be eaier to get a driver's license. Gun ownership is a RIGHT, don't you get it? It's not a privelege that exists at the whim of our politicians. Constitutional, nay basic human rights can not be denied just because a majority of you choose that they be.
If the CDA had not been struck down, how many of us would have taken part in the effort to work around it? How many of us would have written better scripts for our web pages to serve files which are kept on servers in Europe?
Laws are written for peaceable people. Those who are determined to hurt others will do so. Over in the UK I remember a stabbing incident which actually made some people take part in a knife turn in event.
In 1979 my father was murdered by a criminal with a gun. What was the solution? Ban Guns? Ban Bars?(because outside of a bar is where this happened) Ban Divorce?(because my parents were separated and the guy was dating my mother) No. They put the SOB in jail. Why is it now that when a bunch of rich white people face what my family faced do we have calls for sweeping new limits on our freedom?
LK
Posted by Lord Kano-The Gangster Of Love:
>>King George has been dead a long, long, long time, dude. Americans no longer have British soldiers knocking on their doors.
No, instead of Red Coats, it's blue helmets that we must be worried about.
>>The first 10 amendments were named 'The Bill of Rights' out of literary flamboyance on the part of Thomas Jefferson, not out of some perceived ethical universality. In truth they're simply the first 10 (of dozens to follow) amendments.
Either you misunderstand the men and the times of which you speak or you lie. The bill of rights was the putting to paper the inalienable rights that were mentioned in the declaration of independance.
>>Counterquery: Why are there no weekly massacres in my home where there have never been any firearms?
Countercounterquery: Why are there no weekly massacres in my home where there are guns.
LK
Posted by Lord Kano-The Gangster Of Love:
>>King George has been dead a long, long, long time, dude. Americans no longer have British soldiers knocking on their doors.
No, instead of Red Coats, it's blue helmets that we must be worried about.
>>The first 10 amendments were named 'The Bill of Rights' out of literary flamboyance on the part of Thomas Jefferson, not out of some perceived ethical universality. In truth they're simply the first 10 (of dozens to follow) amendments.
Either you misunderstand the men and the times of which you speak or you lie. The bill of rights was the putting to paper the inalienable rights that were mentioned in the declaration of independance.
>>Counterquery: Why are there no weekly massacres in my home where there have never been any firearms?
Countercounterquery: Why are there no weekly massacres in my home where there are guns?
LK
Posted by Lord Kano-The Gangster Of Love:
>>The biggest reason for this tragedy are the gun laws. Guns need more restrictions, no one should be allowed to own a hand gun. Hand guns serve no other purpose then to kill people. Rifles and shotguns on the other hand are used for hunting. You never see something like this happen in Canada or the UK, where they actually have some descent gun laws.
Dunblane Scotland, dickhead.
LK
Posted by Lord Kano-The Gangster Of Love:
>>I don't think anything used in this spree was illegal in Canada and not in the USA. (I.E. Everthing was illegal.) Assuming the handgun was a 9mm as reported and not fully automatic, even it would have been legal in Canada after about two weeks of paper work. However it would have been illegal for anyone under eighteen to possess it and doublely illegal to take it onto school property.
Thank you for reminding me. In the US, it's not legal in most circumstances for a person under 21 to own a handgun. I'd estimate that of the 170+ million legal gun owners in the US that less than 500 fall into the catagory of being able to posess a handgun while under 21. I am the only person whom I know who wasn't a cop who fell into that position.
We NEED TO BAN PLUMBING AND BARBECUE SUPPLIES. More injuries in this case were caused by pipe bombs.
LK
Posted by Lord Kano-The Gangster Of Love:
>>Anyway, a sensible gun control law to my mind might be to allow weapon ownership, concealment, and the like, but to force registeration of all weapons in the same way we force registeration of all cars and drivers.
This is the most reasonable Canadian idea I've seen all day. However I must add a wrinkle. Instead of registering the gun, register the person. For example, in the US you have the right to own a firearm UNLESS you've committed some type of crime that prohibits you from doing so.
If we keep a list of all the people who can't own guns (probably about 2 million people in the US) and whenever someone wants to buy a gun, check to see if they're on the list. If they're not prohibited, they get the gun.
Gun registration is merely a tool for future confiscation. The Nazis did it in europe, they did it in New York, and they'll do it where ever we let them.
LK
Posted by Lord Kano-The Gangster Of Love:
>>Why, if I remember correctly, back in the ole days, wasn't it illegal for anyone not of noble birth (ie. a peasant, not knighted) to carry a sword or wear armor, or even own a horse?
Before the threat of the Normans existed they weren't even allowed to own bows.
"Say there peasant man. For what needeth thou that long bow? Dost thee intend to hunt the king's deer? Off with his head!"
LK
Posted by Nick Carraway:
Remember that the revolutionary Americans had the Atlantic Ocean to separate them from the English, and that the English army was equipped with similar (although somewhat superior) weaponry than the Americans. Both sides were fighting with black powder rifles, fixed bayonets, and slow-firing, hard-to-maneuver cannon. High explosives and repeating arms had not yet been invented. How effective do you think an army of goofy militia types would be against a single Apache helicopter? How about against a squadron of high-flying, carpet-bombing B-52s?
Posted by Nick Carraway:
You're correct, most of our fighting men wouldn't take too kindly to attacking their home towns. However, what if they were being told that their home towns were full of subsersive terrorists who hated America? This happens in other countries around the world, and I sincerely hope that it would never happen here. My point was simply that you can't do battle with the government with a rifle or a handgun. Just ask the Branch Davidians for their opinion on the matter -- Whoops, I forgot, they're all dead. The anti-gun-control camp likes to preach that we need guns to protect us from the government, and that's just so much hokum.
Posted by Nick Carraway:
I wholeheartedly agree with you. Of course Koresh was a freak and a criminal, I didn't mean to imply otherwise. My point was simply that all of his illegal automatic weapons (and he had a lot!) did little to help defend him and his followers against the government. The original point is still that people with guns are no match for people with tanks/helicopters/etc., so the gun lobby's argument about an armed populace keeping the government in check are patently ludicrous.
Posted by Assmodeus:
reality check. i live in and went to high school in the ritzy suburbs of philadelphia. 80 percent of the parents here both work daily...leaving kids to come home to an empty house. to make it worse, our school district has refused to teach "right" and "wrong" to the students, for fear that someone would be offended. well pardon my french but i would be a little more offended if someone walked into my classroom with a fucking gun than if they told us the difference between good and bad. and to see the media try to blame it on everything but themselves really pisses me off too. ive been playing "violent" games since the doom and wolfenstein and all the while since. i havent shot anyone, i havent flipped. neither have any of my friends, and we deathmatch for hours on end. the difference here is that our parents picked up where our schools failed...
my2cents
assmodeus
Posted by lithiticus:
Being picked on is NO EXCUSE for killing anyone, especially attempting to wipe out an entire school in a bloody rampage. This represents failure at the most fundamental level of society. What hope is there for civilization if we can't teach our children basic respect for human life?
The behavior of the two assassins is not inherently unique; people kill people every day with no better reasons than these two had. What makes this case special is that this wasn't done by adults who were completely responsible for their own actions, but by children still technically under their parents control. We've become so desensitized to the horrors that go on around us that we only notice the most extreme examples and even then only until they are out of the headlines.
It is overly simplistic to say that the kids just need to be nicer to each other. In the end, we are the root of the problem. The hatred and bigotry that goes on in schools is only a parody of what goes on out in the grown up world. Until we begin to take life death seriously, how can we expect our kids to?
Posted by TRF:
I've noticed a lot of journalists (but not all) are still fixated on the Trenchcoat, Doom, Marilyn Manson thing. Let's face it people (journalists,) it takes a lot more than that to create a killer. Stop looking for easy answers by blaming what you don't understand.
I saw an interview with Littleton student Alex Marsh on the news. She was confused about her feelings (her friends killed her friends) but she was NOT confused about why it happened. Emotional abuse and alienation caused them to snap. She also mentioned the video games and paintball seemed to help them to deal with their anger. I think she might be right about that. Kinda like taking out your agressions on a punching bag.
I saw another female student interviewed as well. She also talked about the way the kids were treated and offered that as an explaination for why they snapped. She described one of the killers as someone that she "thought highly of." She also described him as a nice person that liked to make people feel better. This does not sound like someone who is going to be pushed over the edge by video games and listening to Marilyn Manson.
I then saw a rather good example of one part of the problem. I believe it was after the vidoeconference between the people of Littleton and Jonesboro. A young male student from Littleton clearly explained that it never would have happened if the killers hadn't been persecuted at school. Immediately after him one of the administrators from the school sitting only a couple feet away from him was given the microphone. The guy said they looked through their records for any reason the kids would have done such a thing. He basically said he had no idea what would have caused "retaliation." It was as if he hadn't heard a word that the student had just said.
Larry King mentioned a psychologist that said harassers at the school have to take part of the blame. I'm sure they didn't intend this to happen, but they created the monster(s) that killed their friends.
In the world of the killers, they were at the bottom of the food chain. They had nothing to lose. They were treated far worse than they deserved to be, and when they retaliated, they treated the other students far worse than they should have been.
Every 45 seconds, another arrest for Linux. 695000 last year. It's time for a change.
Posted by Assmodeus:
.01 percent might make a bad decision because of them? ok now this has turned into a rant and i probably lost all continuity there...
well i didnt really elaborate on what right and wrong they should teach, but we were all told that our actions have no consequences in the end. that we should do what makes us feel good, and be our own person. i mean this is really serious shit for a 15-18 year old to be hearing because it goes against what most peoples parents have been teaching them all their life... im sorry but i feel no pity for that school district, i feel pity for the families of the people who had to lose their lives, but now maybe someone will realise that "oh yeah, maybe we should have taught them that doing their own thing isnt always right" . also, rammstein is VERY tame compared to some of the music i listen to, im still a stable person because i know that what they are singing/screaming/groaning about is not something to try at home. a fully capable person is able to tell the difference between right and wrong, are you saying that you should penalize 99.99 percent of the population of things they enjoy harmlessly because
my2cents
assmodeus
Very interesting, and well thought out, but I disagree. I will use my favorite analogy: the Internet and the printing press. As far as I know (I'm not too big on history) what happened when the printing was invented was that instead of only the "rich" having access to books, newspapers, etc. the masses did as well. Of course the "rich" objected to this and tried to restrict the proliferation of knowledge. And as we know they were not successful.
My prediction is that like any other revolution everyone will be forced to adapt to the Internet. This is already surfacing, I can count on one hand the number of times that I have been in a book store since I discovered Amazon. As for open-source software (and the like), this means that companies like M$ will be forced to find a niche in thier market (what is their "market" anyway -- anything that makes a profit?).
Note: This post is really late, so I may just be talking to myself :^)
Posted by Lord Kano-The Gangster Of Love:
>>I think a bit more thoughful consideration of the issues by both camps would not be out-of-order. By the same token, I rather suspect that more gun control is unlikely to have much effect.
If the pro-gun people could trust the anti-gun people I'd agree with you. 6 years ago we were told that "All we want is a 5 day cooling off period." The next year it was "Ha ha ha, the NRA is impotent. I hear their death knell. We're now going to ban all scarry looking firearms.(we're just going to keep quiet that the guns we ban are used in less than 1/10 of 1% of all crime)" And at the same time Brady II was introduced. Which would have europeanized our firearms laws.
>>In my opinion: more consistent, and more stringent enforcement of the laws already on the books, with *serious*, no-nonsense penalties for firearms abuse would be more effective.
I too agree that the answer is enforcement of existing laws. We've got enough laws on the books to keep most of the dangerous people off of the streets. All we need to do is enforce them.
LK
Posted by Lord Kano-The Gangster Of Love:
>>What we can still see is that in countries where guns are banned, crime is lower.
Except for the crime of government sanctioned (or performed) murder.
LK
Though you may be right about what you said, you've got to realise that different situations have different solutions.
The problem with the US is that there are far too many people ready to object even to a good cause. Hopefully more kids wont die for such stupidity...
Posted by Krag:
To Matt Nalty - a Columbine High student and non-jock - that was on Sally Jesse Raphael-
Here's the deal:
You guys are the sane ones. I was really bummed when SJR put you on
the defensive about your appearance - and one response was "it's
comfortable" - don't let them force you into that corner.
In reality, and for good cause, whether you are fully conscious of it
or not, you
appear as you do (partly) because it makes THEM UNcomfortable.
Your native instinct is to reject corporate yuppie culture - and I'm so
glad you're doing it. It is my cause in life. The same shallow, stupid
jocks that sneered at me in high school are out there right now, 25
years later, still sneering, still clueless.
(And I still dress wierd, and love to goof on them.)
Unfortunately, they run society. (Better to say: The corporations are
running society, and the jocks are just mindless cannon fodder).
Offered the choice between a "Broncos" shirt and a "Rancid" shirt,
anyone with half a brain avoids the corporate football and takes the
struggling small entrepruneur. It's not about "getting attention-" as in
"please pay attention to me" - its about getting attention as in: "Wake
up you stupid L.L.Bean yuppie!"
SJR's packaged bullshit didn't even scratch the surface. Kids (and
adults with a clue) are ALL smoldering, enraged at the stupid way
white-trash consumerism is spoiling Colorado, the rest of the country,
and the rest of the world.
It's enough to make ANYONE want to kill.
Check out my webspace:
http://www.dimensional.com/~randl/tfamly.htm
http://www.dimensional.com/~randl/tcorps.htm
http://www.dimensional.com/~randl/nra.htm
http://www.dimensional.com/~randl/pbib.htm
Posted by PROUD2CARE:
On the one hand you are saying that the parents should have known he was building bombs in the bedroom,on the other you say a minor's computer files are private(AND THE BEDROOM ISN'T?)
You can't have it both ways. My 2 yr. old feels she is old enough to make her own decisions a 14 yr. old knows that isn't true. A 14 yr. old thinks they are old enough to make their own decisions, a 30 year old knows that's not true. I say"if the parents paid for it and you live in their house, they have a responsibility to know how it is used!"!PERIOD!
Posted by D_I_G:
These kids who have been killing have given us the reason, but evidentally, no one is listening. It is revenge. Now, we need to look at what they need revenge for. They have been picked on, beaten up, and tormented by the popular kids, jocks, etc. Granted, it is no excuse to run around killing people; it is the reason they are doing it. We need to pay more attention to the "normal" kids and make sure that they know that their actions can have deadly repercussions and that only loser torment people.
I watched a special on the news. these guys were
wearing DUSTERS. They showed one of the living trench coat mafia guys, and he showed off his duster and explained that they all wore them.
I've noticed lately that people are getting flack
for what the general public assumes is a 'trenchcoat'. this is pretty stupid, so i thought i'd clarify a bit.
trench coat: lapels. think ww1 style.
rain coat: no lapels. closes in front. usually made out of thin canvas.
overcoat: usually double breasted wool or cashmere. worn with suits.
duster: coated with waterproofing. mostly for outdoor use / riding horses
Minorities rule the roost, don't they? All that "special treatment" worked like a charm. Wiped out all the dysfunction of slavery, Jim Crow, "wetback"-bashing, no voting rights, unequal pay, lynchings, beatings...
There isn't a White History month, is there?
No, but that's because there's twelve such months.
It's little wonder, from this perspective, to blame these kids for turing to neo-Nazism, racism and seclusion. These were the only niches of our demented culture that actually offered these misfits a sense of belonging to a community.
A community that's little different from the mainstream, a venue of coded race-baiting (neo-Nazis, at least, don't bother sugarcoating it), cocooning, gated communities, and NIMBY; they were part of the melting pot of Merkin high schools, in the not-unusual market segment of Angry White Males (an anger stemming from their imagined disenfranchisement in the high school venue, as well as the FUD/crap I cite in your above paragraph). Yes, they took it slightly to an extreme, but the very fact that the media (and its consumers) are grasping at silly-straws to find a scapegoat might be an indication that the motivating factors hit a little closer to home than Merkins would like. The US is a country that refuses to come to grips with its own history of supporting terrorism and murder (e.g. Chile and Central America, not to mention within its own borders; support for past and present enemies like Pol Pot, Saddam Hussein, and Osama bin Laden) -- why should I harbor any hope of honest introspection resulting from this week's events?
Those kids were murderers. They weren't crazy, or strange, or all that different from the mainstream. They just looked different, and their actions (especially on Hitler's birthday) were different. The very fact that few politicians/pundits/voters challenge statements like the one I quoted enables people to commit themselves to neo-Nazi solutions; politicians just talk about solving those "problems" (but only because they're pimping for votes), while extremists propose action. It doesn't matter that those "problems" are half-truths at best, it only matters that a majority of people believe they're real.
Aside from a wee piece of thoughtlessness on your part -- views that I hope you don't take seriously -- it was a cool post.
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There's another part of the problem -- a whole egomaniacal mass of people thinking they're "the fulcrum of society", and that they're being "discriminated against" despite being having been the demographic sweet-spot of society for centuries. I seem to have missed the meeting when White Middle-Class Males joined the Unlucky Sperm Club. The vast majority of elected officials are white males; the vast majority of CEOs, for companies large and small, are white males. For decades (including this one) success for white middle-class males was as simple as showing up and getting with the program ("I got in 'cause my parents are alumni..."; "I'm joining the family business..."; "Dad's golfing buddy got me an interview..."); certainly there's umpteen-zillion exceptions, but to whine about discrimination is just childish. Save that for when blacks and Latinos have had a national majority for a generation or two or three, or at least wait until they dominate the PGA Tour and the corporate boardrooms and the state legislatures.
Better yet, leave this sort of whining to the neo-Nazis.
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If you hold any of the traditional, altruistically or reciprocally based moral philosophies, it is incumbent on you to see the profound evil on which everything about current mass-capitalist society is based. Shootings in schools are an effect. The wars in Yugoslavia are an effect: the arms manufacturers have to field-test their products somehow. The media oligopoly which concentrates your attention on the previous two phenomena is an effect. The prison system which you are encouraged to forget about is an effect.
I'm a Christian, one of those Christians who gets really pissed when politicians who profess to Christian values -- or, worse, proclaim that the US is a "Christian nation" -- lock themselves into perpetuating this very un-Christian status quo; their real gods seem to be Money and Power.
I've given up trying to save the world. Even knowing a little of what goes on, and a little of how thoroughly penetrated and programmed I am, a worm of cynical, elitist doubt remains, that most people aren't really worth saving anyway and will fight me if I try. I just try not to go crazy today, today, and leave not going crazy tomorrow for tomorrow. But please, look around you, and look inside yourself. Try to see the ways in which both you and your surroundings have been modified to serve the power structure. Understanding begins with the realization that anything like a shooting in a school, no matter how shattering to its victims, is irrelevant.
From my particular religious discipline, it's not my job to save anybody -- that's JC's job :) -- but I'm supposed to live and serve as best I can, given His model and His Spirit. But the old punk in me comes to the fore on weeks like this; the killings and the disgustingly saccharine media circus remind me of Malcolm X's "chickens coming home to roost" line about JFK's assassination. As long as contemporary capitalism insists on its dysfunctional and malevolent course, led by leaders as corrupt as the worst Pharisee, the chickens will come home to roost again and again. And the old punk in me will just laugh, either nervously or uproariously, depending on whether I'm inside or outside the borders of the Evil Empire on that day.
People like you are reminiscent of some of the Old Testament prophets, who received nothing but scorn and ridicule and marginalization when they pointed out the grave flaws in Israelite society. Israel would end up ravaged either by its internal corruption or its external enemies (or both), and then -- finally -- it would awaken from its cloud of FUD and start to realize that the "crazy" prophet might have had a valid point or two.
Oh well...
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=8^
Maybe if you would realize that nobody gets "quotas and sympathy", you'd be better able to focus your anger constructively. "Rich old fscks" don't give a damn about anything but the preservation of their privilege -- everybody else is just a tool, a means to an end.
This FUD about "quotas and sympathy" was spread by a bunch of "rich old fscks" called the Republican Party; it was so wildly successful that many Democrats have now bought into it. At the very same time, the latter-day careers of J C Watts, Gary Franks, and Clarence Thomas are due to Republicans practicing the very thing they preach against. If you're going to let a bunch of hypocrites define reality for you, you'll get no sympathy from me. You've fallen for a game that has been played since the era of indentured servitude. Do your homework.
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You missed the "certainly there's umpteen-zillion exceptions" line; there is no head-in-the-sand here. I've quoted examples from reality, including mine. You also seemed to miss the point of my post; whites, affluent or not, enjoy the privilege of "normalcy" in US society -- while a white punk or goth can look threatening to J Random Merkin, one of those Jenny Jones makeovers can remove the visual threat. Minorities don't have the ability to simply remove the visual characteristics that produce a kneejerk aversion in many segments of the populace.
And of course not every black and Latino is poor and uneducated -- I never said that; in fact, I come from a city (NYC) where I grew up around affluent blacks, whites, Puerto Ricans, Asians, etc. I merely spoke of numbers: the vast majority of pols and CEOs in this country, dating back to the leadership in colonial days, have been white males. For white males to whine about discrimination is no better than neo-Nazi nonsense; why not focus more on relevant topics like: being a male in a male-dominated power structure, and the assumptions and demands that are foist upon you to be the "breadwinner"? Or focus on why those pols and CEOs have completely destroyed the notion of a "breadwinner" by exporting jobs overseas, thus putting the hourly wage on a slippery slide? I have no problems with the whining of Angry White Males. but I do have a problem with people who have fallen for the trap of making it some sort of tribal issue instead of a political and economic issue.
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I really don't understand how a fully armed society is preferrable to an unarmed society.
What about all the victims who were shot *only* because the criminal feared that they had a gun?
BTW, statistics about lives saved due to guns don't make any sense when you simply do *not* *know* what would have happened if a gun had not be involved.
Is an instant death penalty fair for a punk kid who just wants to steal a few extra bucks?
Is a society really 'free' when you have to sleep with a gun under your pillow? do you really want to live in a society where that is neccessary?
If someone reallys wants kill you they will just do it. Do you really think that they will give a sporting chance and let you reach for your gun? or will they just empty your skull as soon as they see you? what do you think is more likely?
Sure you can. However, such legislation will not produce the desired results. They'll legislate something anyway just to make themselves feel better.
Wansu, th' chinese sailor
Those kids also had *bombs* for crying out loud. The stuff they had was *already* illegal.
You can't legislate against insanity.
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Get your fresh, hot kernels right here!
It was already illegal for the kids to possess those guns and *bombs*. How would additional laws have helped?
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Get your fresh, hot kernels right here!
If people are intent on killing, they will find a way to do so. The most lethal weapon of mass killing in American history was a gas can and a match: remember that.
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Get your fresh, hot kernels right here!
>The most lethal weapon of mass killing in American history was a gas can and a match: remember that.
Actually, it's second to fertilizer (Oklahoma City).
Ooh, a sarcasm detector. Oh, that's a real useful invention.
If we don't stop people like Jerry Falwell, who said that Role Playing Games made kids do this, or Bill Maher, who is convinced that all Children are the spawn of satan anyway, the internet will simply be destroyed by the hurricane of ignorance and stupidity sweeping our country due to stories like this from media Trolls like Wolf Blitzer, Katie Couric, Ted Brokaw, Sam Donaldson, And the like. We need to take a stand against stupidity, and if we don't, we are going to lose big time. Maybe CmdrTaco can start a /. feature of a petition against media trolls.
-shanoyu
JonKatz says that the crime rate for teenagers is falling (from the high in the Eighties). I think part of the reason the total number of crimes committed by teens and also crime rates in general is because the size of that demographic group is decreasing. Men in the late-teens and twenties make up a huge proportion of the people committing crimes. If there are fewer people of that age, there will be fewer crimes committed. Obviously that doesn't explain it all but it's an important part to consider when politicians and law enforcement folks take credit for decreasing murder rates and other statistics.
You make some good points. It never ceases to amaze me that the kinds of people that hear about a tragedy like this one and focus on stupid little details to the exclusion of the real problem are the people who are running our schools. As Jon pointed out, trech coats are being banned. Doom player outreach programs are being started, and God only knows what other crap they'll come up with.
Maybe if these same school administrators wouldn't turn a blind eye to the harrassment and grief that some kids go through, they'd be able to help them before things get to this point. These kids didn't connect in any way with the other students at their school. They didn't seem to see the other students as people. They saw them as their tormentors and lashed out at them as such. If the teachers, administrators, and other students couldn't see that these kids were having problems fitting in and were being persecuted by some of their peers, then they must have been completely unconcerned and/or unwilling to help. I'm not trying to shift the blame off of the killers. I'm simply trying to say that if people had cared at all, then this tragedy might have been avoided and none of those kids would have had to die.
If they had taken note of what was going on and made the effort to try to talk to these kids and get them some help, they might have averted this disaster. During my time in high school, I realized that for the most part, teachers and administrators don't really care if you are treated well by others or not. They don't care that you don't interact at all with other students, or with only a couple specific students. As long as you don't break their rules, they don't care what you do, how you feel, or how others feel about you. By the time these kids decided to break the rules, it was way too late.
Apparently the police have found numerous backpacks full of explosives, as well as a very large bomb in the cafeteria. They are now saying they are quite certain that the two shooters had help. Another student said that he was friends with one of the shooters and that he had been told by him to leave school that day, so he did. Why didn't he realize something bad was going to happen and tell someone? Why didn't the other students who realized something was going on tell anyone? There are many people who could have done something to stop this. None of them did a thing though. I think they are almost as criminal as the killers themselves.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Actually it's necessary in the house AND at the store. That's why you have to fill out a bunch of stuff when you buy a gun. Somehow I don't think these kids got the weapons from Wal-Mart though. Either way, what matters is that nothing was done before it was too late. The parents didn't do anything. The teachers didn't do anything. The other students didn't do anything. Nobody did anything to head off this disaster.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Didn't the Brady bill ban assault rifles? I think it did. I think people are confused about the term "semi-automatic." Most handguns today are either revolvers or semi-automatic pistols. The police use them. The military uses them. They are the standard weapons now. I believe they are only allowed to have a 10 round magazine though. So apparently all of the previous poster's suggestions are already law. They just didn't matter in this case. Criminals don't have alot of respect for the law anyway.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Do you know how many bombs they found in that school? It was over thirty I believe. There was one rather large one in the cafeteria. A big propane tank with pipe bombs strapped to it. Maybe if the kids hadn't spent their time shooting people, they would have just set off all the bombs and killed a whole lot more people. If they want to kill, they will kill. Guns are a more direct way of killing people. You have to physically pull the trigger on each person you shoot. With bombs, you plant them and watch the whole place and everyone in it go up in flames. Don't blame the guns. Blame the killers. They were going to kill, no matter what method they had to use. Be thankful they weren't able to set off the bombs. It could have been much worse.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
These numbers are incredibly high. I'm not sure whether that supports or detracts from your argument. It's hard to believe that there were over 927 incidents in schools where 12 or more people were killed at all, let alone by methods other than guns. Since 54% were drive-by incidents, that means that a fair number of the school incidents were drive-bys in which 12 or more people were killed? Is there someplace we can find these numbers?
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
You couldn't enforce the ban effectively anyway, anymore than the ban on drugs has been effective. You would disarm the population, thereby leaving them to be the prey of those who are bigger, stronger, or criminally in posession of a gun. Perhaps killers will start to use knives or clubs or some other weapon. Am I going to feel safer knowing that someone who breaks into my house will have to beat or stab me and my family to death rather than shoot us? Heck no. People thwart criminals like this with guns all the time. If they didn't have guns, then they become the victims and their lives are put in the hands of the criminal. The police only respond if you are able to call them and even then it takes them a while. They can arrive on the scene in time to pick up the pieces and clean up the mess. That's about it.
We have the right to defend ourselves and our property. We have the right to own a gun. The only thing that should be changed in my opinion is the procedure for getting a gun. You see, the real problem is that any idiot can own a gun right now. You have these morons accidentally killing themselves or someone else, or letting children get ahold of the weapon. This is just plain stupid. You should be required to pass some rigorous tests to prove your competency in using the weapon, as well as your intelligence as to when and how to use the weapon and how to keep it safely away from children or anyone else who shouldn't have access to it. These tests should be very tough and not pushover tests like we have in order to get a driver's license. If this is done, then perhaps we would have fewer people able to buy a gun, and those who are will be informed and competent in its use.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Actually, I believe private citizens and companies did own cannons and ships with cannons onboard. It just wasn't all that common. Those things weren't real cheap. Even if F-16s were legal to own, how many people could afford them?
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Aren't machine guns included under "assault rifles" which are already banned?
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Thank you for stating that so well. Maybe the government should concentrate on getting illegal guns off the streets and preventing people from obtaining guns illegally rather than simply attempting to ban all guns, which would only affect those who are willing to obey the law in the first place.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Sounds like it's a start at least. The question now is whether or not this was just for show because of the media spotlight. Will they continue to promote this kind of interaction between the students or will it die with the press coverage? I sincerely hope they got the point this time and really are working to change things... maybe I'm cynical, but I'll have to see it to believe it. There are too many school administrators that don't want to look at something like this as being the problem. They'd rather pin it on some outside force so that they can pass the responsibility for doing something to fix the problem off on someone else. That way they wash their hands of it and can go back to business as usual.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
That's a bad way to run it then. There shouldn't be a real limit to how many people are allowed to take the test. As long as they don't have a conviction for a violent crime, and they meet the age requirement, they should be allowed to take the test. Doing it any other way is wrong, and should be criminal since it would deprive people of the right to own a gun for self-defense.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
I don't consider myself to be a gun nut. I don't even own one. Not sure if I ever will. I do believe that guns should not be sold to just anyone who is old enough to buy one. I believe there should be mandatory tests before allowing someone to purchase a gun. They should be hard enough to weed out the idiots who have no business being near a gun, and require enough training to make people understand how dangerous a gun can be. They should have to learn everything that a soldier learns about how to use a gun. They should also be taught to make their guns inaccessible to kids. If they can go through this training and pass the test(s), then I believe they have a right to own a gun. I would not deprive them of the weapon for self-defense, especially since most people have no other real defense.
Now, about your bit about gun-nuts. What about all these anti-video-game nuts, anti-violent-movies nuts, anti-(whatever music they decide to go after) nuts, and anti-gun nuts? Every one of them is using this as an opportunity to sensationalize the violence and further their own political agendas. It's a crock. If the kids were watching violent movies when they were underage, then it's their parents fault. Violent video games are usually marked as well. Same with the music. Where were their parents. If these kids were this messed up, then there's no way in hell their parents should have let them listen to or watch any of that stuff. Their minds weren't capable of dealing with it. End of story. Don't go screwing around with everyone's rights just because a couple kids went berzerk. This is why it's not such a great idea that anyone is allowed to have kids and then do nothing to raise them right and then turn them loose on the world. Makes me sick that their parents didn't give a rats ass what they were doing. Hell, they were able to build bombs and stockpile weapons in their homes. Are the parents deaf, dumb, and blind? There's something very wrong here, but it's not with the media. The problem is unbalanced minds that are the product of bad parenting.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
As others have said, apparently the guns they used were illegal anyway. So please enlighten me - how would making guns illegal stop those who are going to break the law anyway?
Sam: "That was needlessly cryptic."
Max: "I'd be peeing my pants if I wore any!"
Fool. "Less guns in circulation" my ass. You mean less LEGAL guns - the number of illegal weapons will NOT significantly change. WHY? Because if they're already breaking the law, are they REALLY going to care if guns are just totally outlawed? Not likely.
Sam: "That was needlessly cryptic."
Max: "I'd be peeing my pants if I wore any!"
Give me a break. I like to hunt - but not everyone who thinks guns are acceptable is a racist, sexist, discriminative psychopath. Why can't people take a second and realize that guns are NOT the problem (the kids made somewhere in the neighborhood of 30 pipe bombs, plus timed incendiary devices of other sorts)? Making guns illegal won't stop people from obtaining them (and I'd LOVE to see you try to get a bill started to repeal the 2nd Amendment - they'd laugh your ass clear out of DC.)
I repeat, DON'T be blinded by emotional vitriol because those kids used guns. The fault lies squarely at the feet of the kids, and their parents (who apparently weren't paying attention while their kids were stockpiling weapons and ammunition, and making pipe bombs), as well as the seemingly blind teachers and school administrators (they don't pay much attention either - they often didn't when I was in high school and things don't sound like they've improved).
Sam: "That was needlessly cryptic."
Max: "I'd be peeing my pants if I wore any!"
I don't think they were insane. They knew what they were doing. But, from what it sounds like, they grew to despise their peers, because of taunting and mistreatment by those peers. That continued to a point where they'd had enough, and what they did seemed (at the time) their only option. I'm not saying it was good, that I approve, or that I'd do the same - I would say no to all those. But I can see how they could reach that point.
Sam: "That was needlessly cryptic."
Max: "I'd be peeing my pants if I wore any!"
I'm sorry, but David Koresh was a complete and utter FRUIT. I feel bad for those people who followed him off that cliff, but the whole thing was insane. Don't try to tell me how they were in the right though - Koresh was a mental case, and should've been getting psychotherapy, not brainwashing people.
Sam: "That was needlessly cryptic."
Max: "I'd be peeing my pants if I wore any!"
I don't believe they were evil. They were just people who look to have been pushed past their breaking point. Taunted, teased, shunned by their "peers" (hah), they just couldn't take it anymore, and they saw no other way out. Mind you, I don't advocate violence like that - it was wrong, and it was NOT their only option. But at the time, it probably seemed like the only option.
Were you ever in a situation like that when YOU were in school? If you weren't, then you have no clue what it can be like. I myself did go through such things, so I can understand how they could get to that point (mind you, I never went on a murderous rampage). As many have said, the school should be held partly to blame for this. Often times, the teachers and other staff either can't or won't do anything about students harassing others. They really need to deal better with students who harass other students, otherwise things like this will continue to happen.
Sam: "That was needlessly cryptic."
Max: "I'd be peeing my pants if I wore any!"
It's called deer hunting. And we eat what we shoot. It's not just because it's fun to go out and shoot at things. Yes, that may be hard for you to understand, but not everyone's a vegetarian.
Sam: "That was needlessly cryptic."
Max: "I'd be peeing my pants if I wore any!"
Rifles (for hunting deer, etc) and shotguns (often use for hunting assorted fowl) are perfectly valid in that context. The point of them, generally, has nothing to do with maiming/killing people. If I want a weapon for self defense, I'm sure as hell not gonna go buy a .30-06 or .270 rifle. You've only proven to me you know a lot less about guns than you think you do.
Sam: "That was needlessly cryptic."
Max: "I'd be peeing my pants if I wore any!"
I know this is a bit too late to be posting so I doubt anyone will ever see this post, but that story was very moving and I'm extremely surprised that it wasn't moderated to the top.
This is the reason I think there should be Anonymous Cowards, not so people can post crap, but so people can tell personal things without fear of consequences.
God(or whoever) bless Freedom of Speech, the good sure outweighs the bad.
It's more likely that if their parents had been 'fascist', they would have hidden their stuff a lot better, and their parents still wouldn't have known.
Besides that, playing with explosives doesn't necessarily have anything to do with being a psychopath and killing people. My friends and I had great fun with explosives, and the only people we ever hurt were ourselves (minor powder burns etc).
Actually, the killing could get worse. For example, some weed killer mixed with driveway cleaner (HCl). If done right, you'd have a whole school dead rather than 15. The point is, you can't reduce the choices enough to do any good without going back to the stone age.
Its not as simple as trying to take the guns away. There is no rational explanation for why this happened.
--
Python
Python
Nah, then the nut cases would just use bombs and kill hundreds of people.
--
Python
Python
The arguement: "there is no evidence on the net or in the media".. what planet are those epole from. These people who make those arguements typically are not psychologists or have a damn degree on the topic. If they did they would know at that age 2-17 the child/kid is heavily influenced by the surroundings.
If the media is guilty, then by that logic teen violence should be up dramatically. It isn't. Teen violence is at the lowest levels since the depression era (as in, lower than in the shiny, happy 1950's).
Why do you think they dress a certain way. Why do you think the trenchcoat mafia crap came from. ,since they were not respected they eventually got to the heads and went on a rampage..
They were glamorized by the mafia in the media, thought it was cool and wore trench coats after seeing a few movies with school violence. Thay wanted to fit in and be noticed so they tried to talk about violent acts to be cool and get noticed. When people laughed at them
Whatever. This is simply absurd. Again, I point out that there is less teen violence now. If violence is being glorified in movies and on TV, then why is violence DOWN?
media will never admit to that. They do nto want to get sued, like natural born killers did. They say "we only replicate real life".. really, I never saw that many things happen to a real person as I see on tv or video.
No, but you realize it's entertainment. What a novel concept: teach a child the difference between movies and reality. Perhaps you should consider that next time.
Next time you watch tv count how may times you see a pro military image of a jet or tank, shooting, explosions, car chase, or fight, and tell me its not influencing anybody...
If it's influencing people, then obviously it's influencing them not to commit violence. After all, teen violence is at its lowest levels since the depression era.
--
Ben Kosse
Remember Ed Curry!
I trust them more than the CDC. The CDC may know a thing or two about the flu, but they are not in criminal justice.
--
Ben Kosse
Remember Ed Curry!
The government and media can spread whatever theories they want. They can call the internet as evil and destructive to the human race as they want. They can try to proxy and censor everything. We already know the true fate of the internet rests entirely on one entity: Microsoft. Microsoft creates and destroys new media technology without wincing over hype. Microsoft's decisions regarding the future of 99% of the human race are unstoppable even by the government. Microsoft tells people what they can and cannot do with their computers. Even Salami Insane, Slobodan Milsevic, and Bin Laden all must bow to Microsoft every time they write an email. Microsoft can turn the internet into a killing machine or a love machine in an instant. When the little people finish hyping internet provoked murders the internet is still going to become whatever Microsoft says it is.
This was the name of the Stephen King's novel, written in 1977. Seems to me to be pretty good description of why those kids took guns and what they felt. Not that anybody who has power to change reads any of those books.
-- Si hoc legere scis nimium eruditionis habes.
Sure. The government is a responsible trustworth entity worthy of our respect. Just look at Kevin Mitnick, still in jail with out a trial. Look at Randy Weaver's wife and kids who were murdered by an overzealous FBI/BATF because their father was accused of a minor firearm infraction (He cut the barrel of a shotgun about 1/4" too short). Look at the massacre in Waco perpetuated by a responsible american government that only wants to protect us citizens from religious nut cases that may or may not be dangerous.
Yep, I sure trust my government not to do anything to us when we're disarmed.
Lets also not forget that the weapons these kids used were obtained illegally. Last time I checked children under 18 couldn't purchase firearms, and you had to be 21 to purchase a handgun.
It's not as satisfying to blame them. They're dead. It's easier to identify them as victems. Especially when you have so many tasty targets floating around like - easy access to guns, easy access to information on how to build bombs, violence, "The Moral Breakdown of America and the American Family (TM)", lack of prayer in schools. . .
Right now the media, and America is focussed on finding someone, and making them pay for what happened so it doesn't happen again.
I feel sorry for whatever scapegoat happens to be standing around.
Personally, I think that the chick (former TCM girl) that was interviewed on CNN said the most poignant thing, that people need to open up and accept otheres. I was an outcast in my teen years, and I shudder to think that that could have been me.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
You don't "govern" children. You parent them. You raise them.
Should I allow my toddler the privacy she needs to run out into the street unhindered so she can be run over by a truck?
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
Okay, let's say you're my little 16-year-old Trenchcoat Mafia Son. You want me to be part of your life and accepted?
"Hey Son, Guess what? I just bought 4 tickets to Marilyn Manson! Let's go dude"
"Hey Son, Wanna smoke a doobe and go check out some good pr0n?"
"Hey Son, Check this out! it's a pipe-bomb. Cool huh? You've got the coolest dad you know. How 'bout a father-son project, out in the garage. I'll show you how to make a propane-tank-bomb. And trust me, THIS timer will work!"
Again, this is not the simple answer. Getting involved will be perceived as prying and interfering, and will create resentment. You've got to build a much closer relationship with the kid much earlier on. You've got to stand far enough away to let the kid develop his or her own life, and let the kid be a kid, and know when to step in. If you did a good job with the "closer relationship" thing, there won't be resentment, and there won't be boundry testing that leads the kid THIS far astray.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
well, personally, if I was a pissed-off outsider teenager, and wanted to kill a bunch of elitist jocks, and if guns were illegal, I would simply wait for them to congregate in a crowd, and run them over with my car at high speed. (like at a football game, on the field, where everyone can see).
Then the press would blame Carmageddon, and the Liberals would want cars banned, and the Conservatives would call for prayer in schools, and the rest of America would still be standing around scratching their heads and wondering how a kid could become so angry.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
...in Rwanda, the weapon of choice was the machete.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
Realistic for England, which has been under strict rule of law during the entire history of the gun.
But in America, there was a sustained period of relative lawlessness, and it's ingrained in our culture. There are over 230 million guns in America. If you outlaw them, there will 230 million illegal guns in America, and their owners will not give a rat's ass that they are breaking the law. I certainly will not give up my gun when they make it illegal.
There are limits to what the law can accomplish. And if they decided to send the national guard to search every citizen's home to enforce this law, you'd have a LOT more deaths on your hands than a few incidents of random violence like this. Trust me. You don't know America.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
Realistic for England, which has been under strict rule of law during the entire history of the gun.
But in America, there was a sustained period of relative lawlessness, and it's ingrained in our culture. There are over 230 million guns in America. If you outlaw them, there will 230 million illegal guns in America, and their owners will not give a rat's ass that they are breaking the law. I certainly will not give up my gun when they make it illegal.
There are limits to what the law can accomplish. And if they decided to send the national guard to search every citizen's home to enforce this law, you'd have a LOT more deaths on your hands than a few incidents of random violence like this. Trust me. You don't know America. People drive around with bumper stickers on their cars that say "you can take my gun when you pry it out of my cold, dead, hand" and these people are serious.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
Realistic for England, which has been under strict rule of law during the entire history of the gun.
But in America, there was a sustained period of relative lawlessness, and it's ingrained in our culture. There are over 230 million guns in America. If you outlaw them, there will 230 million illegal guns in America, and their owners will not give a rat's ass that they are breaking the law. I certainly will not give up my gun when they make it illegal.
There are limits to what the law can accomplish. And if they decided to send the national guard to search every citizen's home to enforce this law, you'd have a LOT more deaths on your hands than a few incidents of random violence like this. Trust me. You don't know America. People drive around with bumper stickers on their cars that say "you can take my gun when you pry it out of my cold, dead, hand" and these people are serious.
"Those who give up essential liberty for temporary security deserve neither."
-Benjamin Franklin
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
"are you expecting the
US people to have to rise up in an armed militia against the government any time soon?"
I've got news for you limey. They already have. Ever hear of Timothy McVeigh? These militant groups consider themselves "at war" with the US Government, and they believe that the US Government is illegal and unconstitutional, and enemies of their traditional way of life (in many ways they are right).
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
... no point in arguing with the limey. They have a long history of government oppression. Why, if I remember correctly, back in the ole days, wasn't it illegal for anyone not of noble birth (ie. a peasant, not knighted) to carry a sword or wear armor, or even own a horse?
And haven't people in the British Isles been brutally repressed by various monarchies for thousands of years (a cool movie called Braveheart comes to mind).
Isn't Majors trying to sweet talk the Northern Irish militants to give up their weapons right now (so he can send in the troops and put them down for good)?
I say that the Irish should keep their weapons, and keep fighting for their freedom.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
... isn't that the city whose mayor was arrested for smoking crack?
... and then reelected almost unanimously after he had served out his jail sentance?
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
Well planned. Took a lot of time and effort, and intelligence.
This is why I say: These kids were not insane. They were angry. Really fucking pissed. A bit hot under the collar.
Why can't America look at the reasons for the anger and address the cause - instead of madly searching for some other scapegoat.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
And in the late 19th century, the newspapers blamed it all on the "penny dreadfuls".
Trust me. Nothing has changed.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
. . . that was the "official" statement on this incident from the FRY.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
. . . that was the "official" statement on this incident from the FRY.
Only they didn't say there was a correlation. They bluntly stated that it was Clinton's direct fault.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
FINALLY!
An intelligent statement on this topic!
Guns don't cause suicidal rampage.
Anger and hopelessness causes it.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
"...Individuals who ..."
accept themselves and are happy can't be controlled as easily as those who feel weak and guilty. That's
how governments and religions have ruled over the society for at least the last millenia.
I wouldn't blame religion strictly either. As with the whole gun debate, religion is merely a tool here, in this argument.
Christianity has other interpretations, which don't necessarily violate the bible. One doesn't need to feel guilty because God made them imperfect, and one doesn't have to feel unworthy because God loves them and forgives them for their imperfections.
Unfortunately, this view did not serve the Catholic church in their medieval methods for controlling western civilization for 2000 years.
(Case in point: Bible says "thou shalt not kill", Pope says "lets go down to Jerusalem and kill all those moslems"). That's why the printing press freed the Word, and once that genie was let out of the bottle, we saw the splintering of the church, and a LOT of bible reinterpretation. Sure, a lot of it hasn't been very good, but some of it has, so not all religion is opium for the masses. Not all hamburgers are McDonalds.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
"...Yeah, you may not be able to buy a new Lexus every year..."
/. last year. something to the effect that "aw gee, your next Mercedes may have to have FACTORY sound."
I read a better anti-materialist jab here on
That cuts a little deeper into the trivia of the matter.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
... add to that the fact that most Texans haven't learned to appreciate the crowded conditions of many of the major Eastern cities. . .
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
yeah, but producing video games does not involve mentally damaging, degrading and exploiting young children (selling them does).
I guess that depends on how young your programmers are, but you get my point.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
"... However it would have been illegal for anyone
under eighteen to possess it and doublely illegal to take it onto school property..."
... and tripply illegal to shoot classmates with.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
just wait. It will come out that these kids were listening to illegal Marilyn Manson MP3s they downloaded off the internet, and THAT will be THE direct cause of the whole thing, and that will be the end of MP3s.
(when, in fact, the Recording Industry planted subliminal messages in THOSE MP3s to instruct those kids to do the whole thing, as a sinister plot to discredit the internet distribution of MP3s. Banning guns is a handy side-effect. Kids not spending money on guns will buy more CDs, no?)
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
thank you. As a Christian, I agree that there are many, many, many Christians out there who DO need a gentle rebuke. Especially when they make statements like that.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
but please don't forget. PEOPLE did all that (in the name of religion). Not God.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
If karma comes back to you - when is it coming back to Bill Gates, huh?
I got news for you.
This is life man.
Bad things happen to good people,
and good things happen to bad people.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
Yeah, but a long trench coat IS handy for concealing weapons. . .
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
a third-degree burn from a 190f liquid is physically impossible.
Third-degree burns require the top layers of skin to be charred-off, and the lower layers exposed and damaged. It requires MUCH higher heat and open flame.
More likely second-degree burns are what resulted, second-degree burns being classified as no more severe than blistering of the skin.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
. . . ah yes. If it hadn't been for these two, poor geek's KNOWING THE CONCEALED TRUTH about blacks (due to their having seen the truth on Neo Nazi web pages), then they wouldn't have gone rampaging through the school gunning for minorities (and athletes, who are all black anyway, right? comes from having to jump and run after antelope through the jungle, right?).
Damn! I KNEW white kids couldn't have done something like this without BLACK people being involved!
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
"... I can see now when all the jocks that terrorized us in Highschool are working for
their dad's at the car dealership have 2 kids an ugly wife and thinning hair..."
hmmm. Is that YOUR revenge?
I can tell you. At my 10-year HS reunion, it wasn't all that satisfying seeing that.
Would I have "gone Postal" had there been that easy access to guns and bomb info when I was in HS? Lord knows there were times when I wanted to. To this day, I don't know exactly why I never did.
Bond to my parents? Fear? Lack of intestinal fortitude?
Lack of opportunity?
Lack of a good example to follow (hey, it hadn't been done before)?
Those were some dark times in my life.
And though their lives are miserable now, and I carry no grudge against the jocks who gave me a hard time throughout my childhood - for this particular incident, I blame the jocks of Littletown and everywhere else in the world, their wolf-pack culture, and everything they represent.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
California is NOT densely populated.
Only two very small regions are.
Ever been to the Mojave desert? The Sierra Nevadas? Napa? Central Coast? Not very crowded at all.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
Some of the popular kids in my school are now working in construction, working daddy's business.
However,
One is head of internet operations at NBC. (never had anything to do with computers). One is an assistant states attorney prosecuting Microsoft in the Antitrust trial... (glad I didn't go postal way back then - heh).
Like I said before. I don't carry a grudge, though I do still have issues. And like someone else said, if only someone had taken these kids aside and TOLD them that High School just doesn't matter. If only I knew then what I knew now, it would have saved a LOT of suffering, and you can be DAMN sure that MY kids will have some clue as to what's waiting for them after Graduation. Hell, I never figured I'd live to be 19.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
hm. maybe the POPE should ask Irish Catholics to stop killing British Protestants. . .
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
. . . they were self-professed bisexuals. . .
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
In many European countries for example, kids' shows cannot contain any violence whatsoever and violent video games are reserved for adults, just like hardcore porn. Soft porn is freely available to children. Americans on the other hand don't allow their children access to soft porn, but tolerate depictions of violence.
Overall, this seems counterintuitive, since America's problems with violence seem a lot bigger than Europe's problems with sex.
--
Even though these horrible massacres are extremely rare events, they nevertheless happen. In Littletown, two kids decided to give in to their anger. Only two. However, how many other harbor the same feelings? How many others accumulate pain and anger and humiliation, day after day? How many will let their pain grow to the point that blinds them with genocidal fury? These two kids were also victims, victims of a society that has failed to provide them guidance and hope for a better tomorrow.
For one thing, we live in a society where parents are not allowed to raise their children with discipline. A parent cannot send his child to his room, or grab him by his arm when he doesn't want to leave the toys section without running the risk of being accused of child abuse. Parents cannot go through their children's belongings and professors and guards cannot check their lockers because they are violating their privacy. How is a parent to know what their children think or what they are up to with such constrains?
There is also the case that parents do not pay the necessary attention to their children. This is not because they don't care. It is just that they can't or don't know how. After a 9-to-5 job and a 1 hour drive, parents just give up. How many parents out there spend dinner together with their kids? Even worse, how many parents schedule a half hour talk with their children? And quite honestly, there are parents who buy computer gadgets so that their kids stay still for hours while they rest and dream of their lost youth.
There is also the fact that kids in general have no ideals or goals. No heroes, no leading figures to imitate, no useful goals to pursue, that's the world our children live in. Ask any kid at random and ask him who Ghandi, Jesus, Lincoln, Einstein or Neil Armstrong is/was. Most likely all you will get are "I dunno, I don't care" stares. Also, it is not sufficient to know who they were and what they did. Children should have leading figures whose lives were conducted in such a way that inspire imitation. Children must thrive in an environment that nurture their intellects, that keeps their mind busy. There is nothing more wasteful (or more dangerous) that a young mind without clear direction.
Even though there is no clear indication that the media or violent computer games have anything to do with these killings, it will be greatly irresponsible to dismiss them as catalysts in this rampage. Bobby plays DOOM, and Kate likes bloody movies, yet they don't go berserk. Does that mean DOOM or violent media are not variables in this equation? No. One has to differentiate between what we call normal kids and those that are in a pathological state of mind. The effects of violent games and media on these groups cannot possibly be simplified or generalized. A healthy minded person would know better not to live DOOM-like. Can anyone say the same about a socially-abused kid?
One thing for certain is that this society is paving his own path of self-destruction. We have failed our younger generations, and we are not willing to fix it because it may involve giving up many things we dearly hold. I'd rather be a realistic pessimistic than an deluded optimistic. Unless someone proves me wrong, I think we have not seen the worst from our children yet. We'd better think that way and review our social and educational infrastructure than hope these problems are going to go away.
Blaming this sort of thing on guns is as silly as blaming it on Doom. Gun accessability has always been high in the US. As many times as its been said there's a lot of truth in 'guns don't kill people, people with guns kill people'. Those who want to kill will always find away.
Is there someplace we can find these numbers?
I doubt it - they look made up to me. 500 school drive by incidents of mass knifings - that's over 5,000 school kids killed by drive by knifings. Bwahahahaha.... Don't make me laugh.
Matt. Want XML + Apache + Stylesheets? Get AxKit.
Something like 0.1% of all injuries by gun use are from people defending themselves.
i.e. people having access to guns isn't helping anyone except the criminals.
Matt. Want XML + Apache + Stylesheets? Get AxKit.
Japan has no guns, Switzerland has at least one gun in every house by law. Both have low crime. It's not guns.
Drugs exist in EU scandinavian countries, with lower crime than US. It's not drugs.
Hollywood movies, video games, etc, are all over the world, it's not that...
War?!? USA is always involved in some military act, UK to a lesser extent, Japan and Switzerland hardly ever. Canada follows way behind the USA as far as military action. South Africa has had the Zulu wars, segeration, and much military violance, and, high crime. It would seem that millitary agression might corelate to social agression.
Wether this is an indication that nations are militarily violent as an extention of thier inner hostility, or if the national justification of war translates to promoting agression in general, reaching our home streets, I don't know.
If there is a better correlation for this military/social connection than there is to TV, Games, Drugs, Guns, Internet, ... I think probably, I would like to see a good study on it.
The Zuit Suit Riot's isn't just a cute pop song, FYI. It was a violent gang of anti-war thugs that beat the living heck out of sailors and other military members on leave, and created quite a non-war related crime wave.
Protesters during VietNam bombed buildings in Universitys... I know for a fact my father was a police officer stationed in Chicago when someone snuck in and droped concrete blocks on the heads of sleeping police officers...
Don't give me this "when we were at war before, everything was peacefull at home" crap, because it's absoulutely false. Crime goes up when the country is at war.
And the more violent countries are those that allow freedom, like the USA, South Africa...
I don't see that really adding up like your saying.
Wonder if that monster size link will work, it's just one of hundreds of such comments though, I am sure you can find some of your own.
"These kids were the children of our society, we let them down and they bit the hand that should have fed and nurtured them - but failed to do so."
Amen.
-Rev. Randy
- Kate
"DNA is life. The rest is just translation."
Everyone wants to place blame on someone else for the killings. Blame the parents, blame the media, the video game creators, the musicians, the Internet.
Bullshit.
I blame the other kids who tortured these two unstable children to the breaking point.
We (In the US anyway), have a tendency to alienate anything or anyone that we consider "different". As adults, if we were subjected to the treatment that these kids were, I'm sure many of us would crack under the strain fairly quickly. Let's not forget that this kind of thing happens to adults too. How many of you have made "postal worker" jokes in the past?
No one wants to blame themselves, and everyone rushes to tell the other children "It's not your fault, they were bad kids." Well, I think they should be told that If they were one of the kids that teased them or made fun of them, this is partly their fault. The other children contributed to it as much if not more than any other influence. You should be careful about how you handle another person's emotions, you have no idea what you're doing to them inside, or what they're capable of.
It's a terrible thing. I wish it hadn't happened. But it'll happen more frequently until we teach our young people how to be more tolerant of others. The only way we can do that is by setting a good example.
"the murdered should not be held unaccountable for being murdered, and the robbed are not completely blameless for being robbed. For it is the cornerstone of the temple that is no higher than the lowest stone in it's foundation."
-Rev. Randy.
- Kate
"DNA is life. The rest is just translation."
If you look at the statics for both automobile deaths and shooting deaths, you will come across an interesting connection.
Alcohol (and/or drug use).
Hey, perhaps we could simply do away with alcohol. That would (apparently) cut down on the deaths from both automobiles and guns. After all we don't NEED alcohol.
The last time I heard of an inanimate object killing someone, it was a rock that fell off of a cliff. Before that, it was an avalanche. I've never heard of a gun killing anyone.
Good judgement comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgement.
- W. Wriston, former Citibank CEO
The gun is not the problem.
The fork is not the problem.
You the killer, potential or actual, are the problem.
Good judgement comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgement.
- W. Wriston, former Citibank CEO
The stats that you never see are the ones that show the benefits of "gun freedom".
How many times has an assault been thwarted by an armed citizen?
What stopped the teen school shooting in Arkansas? An armed citizen.
Which states in the US have the lowest rate of crimes with deadly weapons? The ones that have enacted must issue concealed carry permit laws.
Which state in the US has he *lowest* assault crime rate? The one that has *no* gun regulations of any kind.
Which city in Pennsylvania has the *highest* crime rate? The one that excluded itself when the rest of Pennsylvania enacted the concealed carry laws.
Did crime rates fall in the rest of PN after these laws were enacted? Yes. Did crime rates rise in Philadelphia after it excluded itself? Yes.
You figure it out.
Good judgement comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgement.
- W. Wriston, former Citibank CEO
Indeed, no weapon has ever been put on trial.
Good judgement comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgement.
- W. Wriston, former Citibank CEO
For a single, deployable weapon yes, nuclear bombs were the most devastating. For which bombing raid killed the most people in a single day, lookup "incendiary", Dresden, Tokyo, and perhaps "fire storm".
Good judgement comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgement.
- W. Wriston, former Citibank CEO
This is the first bit of sense regarding ths matter I've seen.
Those that tease, taunt. and torture, should expect that some of the people they treat this way will react by killing others.
If you constantly beat a dog with a stick, the next time he sees a child with a similar strick, he will likely attack her.
Does this mean that the killers are blameless? No, but those that do things that are "wrong, but silently accepted" should be held accountable as well for encouraging others to become unstable.
This isn't the same as admonishing people to "walk on eggshells". Just because something one does may annoy somebody doesn't make it wrong. However, if one would not wish to be on the receiving end of what they dish out, they should be held accountable for the consequences.
In Liberty, Rene
Supposedly they were teased because they were homosexuals.
Certainly, this doesn't justify murder in response.
However, what everyone seams to be missing is that justification is NOT required: push someone enough and they might kill in response.
You don't do this for the same reason that you don't cross the street with your eyes closed.
In Liberty, Rene
The point being this: w/o guns people are more suceptable to muggings/rape/murder/what-have-you, but with them their chances of escaping personal harm increase. Granted, it is also possible that the criminal will be able to take the weapon away from the person, but as far as I'm concerned, I'd prefer to have to ability to protect myself or at least the *option* to protect myself. With laws preventing the ownership of guns by upstanding citizens, people do not even have the option of protecting themselves.
And there are laws for the purpose of keeping guns out of the hands of criminals, not that those make much difference to the criminals...
--
Gabriel Cain.
http://gabrielcain.com/
That was a good posting which made me think about something else - but still related:
Our society encourages stereotypes and conformity while trying to suppress individuality. Individuals who accept themselves and are happy can't be controlled as easily as those who feel weak and guilty. That's how governments and religions have ruled over the society for at least the last millenia.
In our own community, the bleeding edge, we can notice that very well: FUD is nothing Microsoft invented, it's been used to rule the world for ages, now after religion and government the media is in charge. They have been corrupted. They want to remain in control. Blame is issued, scapegoats are denounced, outsiders (those not directly in the know) are mislead - just think of what the gullible public will think of these events (as they don't read Slashdot's discussions, only well-known media)...
Such things have to change. People have to regain their responsibility. And give up judging others from their own views, realizing that One-Size-Fits-All doesn't fit anymore, times are changing now. You can see it right here: RedHat vs. Debian (vs. Slackware & Co.), KDE vs. GNOME (vs. CDE & Co.), Linux vs. GNU (vs. BSD & Co.)!
Silly flame wars, useless fighting, just use and support what you want without trying to convert others - then you use your energies reasonably.
Back to the topic at hand: We shouldn't try to prevent those problems ("random" outbreaks of violence) by banning anything (guns, games, media coverage), we should SOLVE the problems, so all of us have to reconsider. Parents and children alike. Even better: together!!
-- Eavy (: Linux Is Not UniX
"That's why the printing press freed the Word"
Oh, that just struck me with an analogy, think about this: Luther (an individual) used a (new - at that time) medium, the printing press, that (in effect) freed people from the powerful grip of the church (religion) after severe fighting and struggling. Now we have the Internet (another new medium) that might (hopefully) empower individuals to free themselves from the powerful grip of the government. I'm not speaking of anarchy, we still have religion, but nowadays the balance between danger and help has shifted.
Yet - if history repeats itself - other powers (corporations) might take over the net and corrupt it? Well, keep in mind, history isn't repeating itself but evolving! This time it might be different...
-- Eavy (: Linux Is Not UniX
I find the psychology of society's reaction to these massacres more interesting than the psychology that led to the massacres. And after watching such things for a while, here is my conclusion: that when mass murders happen, the first thing society does is to try to differentiate the murderers from the rest of us. Whether they played Doom, or had a web page, or wore black, or listened to different music... whatever excuse we make, it's all about *how they are different from us*. Why? Because if we *don't* find some rationalizable excuse for their difference, then we have to face the potential for mass murder in each one of us.
Robert Anton Wilson, in his short story "Von Neumann's Second Catastrophe", gave an interesting theory about war... war isn't about killing enemy soldiers, it's about killing civilians, defenseless women, children, and old people. Killing someone who is already a direct threat to you isn't a big leap. But gunning down unarmed civilians (or torching them with napalm as we did in Vietnam, or blowing up their water supply as we did in Baghdad) is a real feat - the man who can do it has gone totally beyond morality, and at least for the moment has power beyond most of humanity.
(ps: Robert Anton Wilson should be required reading for anyone who doesn't want to be a sheep the rest of their lives. Some of you might recognize the name "Frank Sullivan")
Hand me that airplane glue and I'll tell you another story.
WORLOK:
You are a disturbed person. You should probably seek profession help (better yet, kill yourself, please). Such a lack of respect for individual freedom and your fellow human beings is absolutely disgusting. It's a shame you were born into this world, I'm sure you would be much happier living in a totalitarian regime such as that of Hitler.
A kid in my school, a middle-class white male at that, is one who dons a Trenchcoat sometimes and wears black most of the time. On Wednesday, he came into school, after the Littleton incident was all over the media, wearing a black trenchcoat and acted like he was shooting people. Well, this kid got out of school suspension for a day or so. It shows how tight some people are on this issue, espically those involved with school. The next day, the whole was evacuated because of a bomb-threat, the first one in the history of the school. Aftershocks of the killing spree?
--
Scott Miga
I'm sorry, but this pisses me off. Do you know anything at all about the case to which you refer? I doubt it. The woman wasn't holding the cup between her legs, it was in her hand. The bottom of the cup dropped out and spilled the coffee on her lap.
Actually, yes, I do know a little about it, and I'm not refering to the first stories that went around. However, as I have heard it, repeatedly, it *was* between her legs, and it spilled. I have never heard anything at all about the bottom dropping out of the cup.
McDonalds had gotten multiple complaints that the coffee was served too hot (~300F, I believe!) and that the cups couldn't take that temperature safely.
Actually, I'm positive it wasn't that hot. 300F is well above boiling, and *no one* servers anything that hot. As I recall, it was around 180F, which is very hot, but not entirely unreasonably so.
The coffee was so hot she suffered 1 degree burns all over her lap.
Actually, I believe she suffered first and second degree burns.
She initially just wanted McDonalds to pay her medical bills, after she was told that there had been many similar complaints about the heat of the coffee and the McDonalds had ignored them.
Again, I have never before heard anything anywhere about the bottom of the cup dropping out, and I'm sure it wasn't 300F degrees. As the bottom didn't fall out, she spilled it on herself. If I were to spill hot coffee on myself, I would not be suing over it. I would accept that it happened, and move on.
McDonalds refused, so she took them to court. A jury slapped McDonalds with a huge punative damage fee,because McDonalds tried to try the woman in the press. This "urban myth" about it being her fault is bullshit.
No, I don't think so. If she spilled the coffee, she should live with that. And while I'm very glad that the huge punitive damages were later revoked by an appeal, the simple fact that she was originally awarded some 2+ million dollars shows my point quite clearly.
Regardless of this one single example and whether or not I, your, or anyone else has the facts exactly right, you've manged to miss the main point of my post. I'm not interested in arguing a single case as much as I am making a point.
Topher
The #1 sickening thing about the whole McDonald's coffee hype is how it distracts from the facts. I suppose you just glibly believed whatever it was the mass media told you about that McDonald's case didn't you? Why do you expect anyone else to behave differently when it comes to the hacker culture (or whatever you want to call it today)?
In fact, I actually am fairly familiar with the McDonald's Coffee case. And no, I don't just 'glibly believe everything the mass media told me' and I'm somewhat annoyed that you would make that statement based on a single meaningless example.
However, I'm not posting here to argue one single example. You see, that was just one of many examples that I chose for the sole reason of making a point. Instead of reading my post for it's meaning, you picked out a single example I used and focused on that.
Regardless of anything else, she did spill coffee on herself, and then expect someone else to 'fix it'. We could debate endlessly on whether or not it's her fault for spilling it, or McD's for serving her hot coffee too hot, but it doesn't matter. The point is responsibility. Try rereading my post and skip this one example, then see what you think about it.
Topher
Yeah, but a long trench coat IS handy for concealing weapons. . .
It's not a big deal though, and it depends on what you are trying to conceal. I could conceal a pistol in any coat as well as in a long trench coat, and I could conceal just about anything I wanted to easier in a book back or gym bag than a long trench coat.
If someone wants to sneak something in to somewhere, they are going to do it. Nothing short of forcing them to come in naked will stop them. Whether they are wearing a long trench coat, or a smaller jacket, or carrying a book bag, it's all fairly irrelevant.
Topher
I don't think anyone will deny that those two kids are responsible for killing all those people, but that isn't the point here.
Actually, I don't think I miss the point. In fact, what you are stating is much the point I was trying to get across. I think I just wasn't clear enough on it and you misunderstood me.
You see, we can hold them responsible for their actions, and that is the point. What we need to *not* do is shift the responsibility to everything and everyone else. It should be left simply as, "These people did something really really bad." Instead of saying it was because of the music they listened to, or the TV/Movies they watch, or the clothes they wear.
You say that you don't think anyone will deny that those kids are responsible, but that's exactly what is happening.
Calls for more personal responsiblity don't mean anything because the killers killed themselves. You can't hold someone accountable if they want to die. The appropriate question is, what made them want to do it, not who is responsible for it.
It still does mean something. It means that instead of blaming everything else that's more convenient, we face the reality that sometimes people do things that are really bad. Most people don't want to believe that other humans are capable of such horrible things, so they seek to find something to blame instead of the people responsible.
Topher
What really bothers me here is that you are taking a single example I used and turning that into the centerpiece of this discussion. You see, I really couldn't care less about this one example. It was to make a point, which you are ignoring, and I still feel it is a fairly valid example.
Whether or not the coffee was 'hotter than she could reasonably expect' is up for debate, and your statement about broken glass is terribly flawed. Coffee is expected to be hot. That's how it is served. How hot is debatable, but it should still be hot. Eggrolls are expected *not* to have broken glass in them. These situations are not even related. However, it is also expected that when you have hot liquid in your hand, you shouldn't spill it on yourself. Whether it's hot, really hot, or 'hotter than she could reasonably expect' is irrelevant. It's simple common sense that if you spill it on yourself, you are going to get burned.
You are also infering a lot of things that I've not said, nor do I believe. I do *not* believe that after the old lady had the coffee spilled she should be kicked in the ass, ignored, and thrown to the wolves. However, she should not expect everyone to immediately take responsibility for her spill.
But, again, how everyone else reacts, and who does and doesn't help her, isn't the topic of my post or this discussion.
Topher
The problem with our society today is that no one is willing to take responsibility for their own actions. It's become the accepted thing to shift all blame to something or someone else for anything that we do wrong.
"I just spilled hot coffee on my lap. But, wait, it's not my fault that I was driving around with hot coffee in my crotch and it spilled, it's the place who sold it to me, because they sold it hot."
"Well, yes, I went out and laid down in the middle of the street, and for some amazingly unbelievable reason, I didn't realise I was going to get run over by a car. It wasn't my fault, it was because I saw it in a movie."
"Yes, I went out and shot 10 people, but it wasn't my fault. It was because when I was 6 years old, my daddy looked at me wrong and made me feel uncomfortable. You might even say he sexually abused me. It's his fault."
"My kid committed suicide, and it's all the fault of that music. My kid was a happy, intelligent, nice boy, and would never do something like this on his own. It's all because of that music he was listening to. That rock music should all be banned."
"Yeah, I killed some people, but it's because of the TV, movies, and video games that I watch. Sure, 100 million Americans and millions more people around the world are able to watch these same TV shows, movies, and video games for hours and hours more than I have, and they are able to live in society without killing people just fine, but it's not my fault. It was the violent imagery I've been subjected to all my life."
It's kind of interesting, isn't it? A little bit of a central theme running through there? Instead of people just standing up and saying, "Okay, yes, I screwed up. I'm sorry." They all have to have an excuse, a reason, a childhood event, or an influence that somehow has managed to cause all of their problems, and drive them into doing what they do.
And along with this basic and simple societal defect, we have the media. The media who is always after the sensational story, and who greatly aids in people's desire to not take responsibility for their actions. Thanks to them, we have schools banning Doom, trench coats, and all kinds of other things.
This is just stupid. I've worn a large long black duster, very similar to a trench coat, for years now. Does this mean that all of a sudden I'm going to freak and kill a bunch of people? Hell no, it doesn't. You see, it's not the coat, the music, the movies, the TV, or anything else like that that causes these types of things. It's simply the people who do it that are the problem.
You see, a normal person can play doom, wear trench coats, watch violent TV and movies, and do.....nothing. Because they're normal well adjusted kids who realise that killing people is, um, wrong? The people who do this kind of thing are people with severe emotional and psychological problems. Otherwise, no matter what music, movies, games, or coats they enjoy, they would know better.
"Man's stupidity is eclipsed only by his ability to deny his own stupidity."
Topher
The guns in the black market for the most part are weapons which were once legally owned either by individuals or a gun shop. These weapons get stolen via breaking and entering and turned over to a fence for a quick profit. There is some number of guns that are actually imported illegaly but the number is a relatively low percentage. Cut off the source of the black market (i.e. restrict the sale of non-sporting fire arms to the general public) and most of the problem will quickly diminish. Some criminals will still manage to find weapons but by and large this won't be the case. Case in point: Canada, its fairly difficult to get a license for a handgun therefore most home owners don't have them (you need to prove you're in imminent danger, or have to be a member of a gun club in which case you don't have the right to keep it at home anyway). Compare the violent crime statistics of any large Canadian city to an appropriately sized American city: the murder rate will be much lower. There is crime in Canada, but murder is much lower per capita than in the US.
Other weapon types aren't restricted, if you want to hunt and want rifles or shotguns thats fine though you do have to be licensed. It's much more difficult to conceal a twelve gauge shotgun however.
The black market for firearms isn't very large, regardless of Canada's own war on drugs, because the ready source of firearms is missing.
//"You can't prove anything about a program written in C or FORTRAN.
It's really just Peek and Poke with some syntactic sugar."
What do the following individuals have in common:
-Robert B Laughlin
-Horst L. Stormer
-Daniel C. Tsui
-Walter Kohn
-John A Pople
-Jose Saramago
Answer: Won 1998 Nobel prize
What do the following individuals have in common:(sp)
-Tim McVeigh
-Ted Bundy
-John Wilkes Booth
-Jeff Dahmer
-Lizzie Borden
-Lee Harvey Oswald
Answer: They KILLED people(or are known to)
For those of you who could more easily identify the second group, you're not alone. In fact I have never head of any of these Nobel Prize winners before writing this post which further illustrates my point. The quality of an individuals achievment has no definate relation to their name recognition. Now in these situations, name recognition was probably not a factor in the their achievments, nor in any worthwile task should it be (IMHO) It is a shame that most people don't view it this way. Success is often judged not on actions but recognition of your actions. Hence the timeless tradition of philanthopic practices in return for naming priviledges. (Best, and most ironic, example is the Gates building at MIT- a college building named after a college dropout which may house the HQ of GNU)
What does this roughly translate to:
Success == Fame == name recognition == getting credit for your actions which gain public attention.
Now how do you gain this public attention. You could cure cancer, be elected to public office, play pro basketball, write an excellent operating system. But each of these requires skill, patience, luck and/or time. There of course is the simple shortcut of trying to kill your entire school. This takes little planning, some supplies (guns, propane tanks and nails for shrapnel) and an extreme desire to be noticed. Within 48 hours of the killing, the entire world will know who you are, all about your life and (for people like me) have your face etched in the minds of thousands. For an individual desperate to be known, this is a pretty appealing notion. To hell with the consiquences, I want to be (in)famous.
The next question usually asks "where do they get the inspiration to do this?" The answers include movies, TV, video games, the Internet. My answer is who cares! As long as actions such as this are relentlessly covered by the media, the possibilty of instant fame will still inspire people to commit such attrocities.
What is the solution... there is none. The media will continue to add fuel to the fire as long as they cover the story, others will be inspired, more people will die. We will then try and point fingers at everything but our own hearts, because we can't accept that humans are capable of doing this alone. But we are...
--- Linux... a college project gone horribly right
...
The plain truth is that there will always be would-be killers. The only way to reduce the number of people they actually kill is to take away the means of mass slaughter - ie guns.
If it truely is a genetic problem, then the only way to reduce the effects of people with mental problems or genetic "defects" would be to actually NOT produce these kinds of people by controlled breeding in order to REMOVE THEM FROM THE GENE POOL -- which is something we should be doing anyway in order to optimize certain traits like longitivity and disease resistance.
Unfortunately, stupid breeds faster than smart.
Believe me when I say that there's a lot of tools of "mass slaughter"- and not all of them are guns. Ignorance of that very fact is at the heart of that old premise that you're using. If guns aren't allowed to the people, who should have them? The government alone? Please, be more realistic.
And, shouldn't you be asking whether or not you're looking for scapegoats too? After all, you're blaming guns for the problem- when it's not guns at all, it's something else. You've got to realize that in espousing your reasoning that you're no better than the person you're tarring with that big brush.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
The Bible wouldn't have things like that in it- thank the Lord. You're not going to find answers in all of this by making statements like that.
They're looking for scapegoats- so are most of us. We need to find the CAUSE- not something to blame.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
I notice a repeating pattern here.
A says X is to blame.
B says Y is to blame.
:
:
Z says Q is to blame.
AA says "I notice a repeating pattern here. All these people say X,Y...Q is to blame. None of these are to blame. It''s really..."
BB says.....
AAA says "I notice..It's really that they are psychological mistfits"
:
:
I read an article in the NY Times today. It says that in fact one of these kids had a father who worked from home (so much for the absent parent theory) and people saw their parents came to their baseball games and gave them lot's of moral support (so much for the uncaring parent theory). That they went out on dates and had friends (so much for the socil misfit theory). That their friends thought they were quite normal (so much for the psycho theory). That they had counseling and came out of it great (so much for the nobody cared theory).
Well folks, how about facing up to the fact that some people are evil. Some people think killing is ok. They could have great parents, listen to mainstream music, be perfectly cultured, pass any psychological test and still think they have the right to kill. Lot's of Nazi's were like that.
Americans love to believe that EVERYTHING can be fixed. American's can't accept the idea of evil, because evil isn't something you can "fix". You can fix societal problems, you can fix a psycho, but you can't fix someone (like Milosevic and the Serbs) who have a different moral outlook than you do. That's why acknowledging evil is so scary. it goes against the fundamental tenants of American society.
Evil exists in all societies and since the beginning of time. The only solution to evil when it strikes is to fight back and destroy it. The only (very partial) solution to prevent evil from striking, is to keep it from access to the tools of destruction. America has more mass murderers than any other society, not because there are more evil people here, and not because of anything else about American society. It is only because evil people have easy access to means of mass destruction. It is their constitutional right!
Your response is based on a mechanistic world view that believes that every action anybody does is a derivative result of factors either in the environment or in their nature. I don't accept this mechanistic world view. Neither did Jesus, Mohammed, Descartes and Sartre to name just a few. I guess you think they are all idiots too.
Here I am.. im 19 years old and I would be the media's prime suspect for a
school shooter. I played Doom all the way through, laughed with glee when I
killed hundreds and thousands of creatures while playing that game, and
hundreds of other people while deathmatching. I got into Duke3d and killed
hundreds of more people and looked at half naked dancers. I played Harvester
and watched as townsfolk died by my hands so that I could join the order (If
this one ever made it to a console system it would have been the one to
blame). And I played Quake and Quake2, killing a number of people probably in
the hundreds of thousands in the process. I watch violent movies all the time. I see them on opening weekend. Ive seen everything from The Matrix to as far back as the Rambo movies.
In school I have no friends, I sit around and sleep. I am a very depressed
person, I used to get suicidal alot and sit a cry wondering why everyone picks
on me and why no one likes me. The games have desensatized me to the point
where hearing on the news that 15 kids were shot and killed cause they were
"preps" doesnt phase me. And everyone in my school has picked on me at one
time or another.
I have access to guns, I know where to get the "cookbooks" to make bombs. I
could, if i wanted to, do exactly what the littleton kids did. But would I?
No. I see the images on TV of the kids crying and dead bodies being taken out
on stretchers and I wonder "Why the hell would someone do something like
that." It was stupid. A group of guys that supposedly got picked on alot
kill all the "preps". I wouldn't go kill everyone at school, if not for the
fact that killing is wrong and stupid then for the fact that I dont want to be
known as "yet another school killer". So if I have all the traits that any
other school shooter did then why do I think that its stupid to do something
like that and they go and do it?
I guess that there will always be psychos in the world, if not in schools,
post offices, and federal buildings then somewhere else. And as long as these
psychos are around their psychoticness will be blamed on "Doom" and "The
Media" but there is something more behind all this, something that mentally
makes these kids want to kill. I dunno what it could be but being an avid
video games player, action movie watcher and depressed person I can say that
they should try looking to somewhere besides the usual scapegoat.
Ken Mitchner PHP/SQL Programmer Currently Seeking Employment
A 14-yr. old in Maine was mentioned, whose parents
inspected his files for signs of "anti-social
behavior"! I say why not, maybe if more parents
actually *paid attention* to their kids and *kept
tabs* on what they were up to, we might have fewer
problems.
Well, for one, I'm not 14 years old, actually i'm
a full-blown adult. And according to Katz,
the kid was present when they went through his files.
It wasn't like some covert raid.
He's 14 for cripes sake, does he really need the same privacy
that an adult needs? Either you are a terrible
parent or you've never raised children.
If these 2 kids' parent had gone "fascist" and
raided their bomb factory, there'd be 15 teenagers
still alive today in my hometown. Think about that.
Why do kids kill? Why do dictators kill? Who kills the most? Do evil dictators play doom and surf internet porn?
Or is the media failing to research what they report?
Guns we can do without. These other things we cannot without losing a lot. So get rid of guns..
You can get rid of your guns, as you might not need or use them. I prefer to eat meat that has not been raised on a slaughterfarm pumped up with antibiotics and steriods from an animal that lives a life of abuse. For me, a gun provides a healthy, lean dinner on the table. Now, for a city slicker that never gets out deep in the woods, a tool that sends a high speed projectile a mile and a half might not be a good idea.
Let me remind you that a loaded firearm in a moving vehicle, less than 20 feet from a road, or discharging in city limits is illegal. Shoot a turkey out of season here and not only loose your car, gun, and anything else involved in the above acts, but pay a fine of $10,000 and $100 per pound on top of that. Gun laws are strict and are enforced. If you have a complaint, make it formal. If your ciy does not care, I suggest you move, because there goes the neighborhood!
Yes - but it is a tool for efficiently killing people. Stop the sale of guns and people will find it harder to kill masses of people
I love stacking my barbecues in the shed at the end of summer - you can't beat a bit of grill on grill action.
Since it comes with most big linux disro's (RedHat,debian, etc...) i guess that make linux evil to... better ban it too. :)
I have to return some videotapes...
(this was a big city HS in Brooklyn, NY)
...richie - It is a good day to code.
Ahem... I believe it was all first born sons. This particular scene in the movie "Prince of Egypt" gave my seven year old daughter the hee-bee-jeebies.
...richie - It is a good day to code.
every kid, especially every adolescent, has feelings of rage, feelings of agression sometimes. pure natural adrenalin rushes, that in the biological order of things prepare them to become adults, prepare them to become leaders. in every class there are one or two bullies (alphas) and one or two outcasts (omegas). that's just the natural order of things, we have that in common with almost every other pack animal.
in the natural order of things children would play and fight among eachother just like lion cubs do. but those acts of agression are seen as bad nowadays, and the agression is kept inside, which in turn can and will turn into stress. just like adults on the job who hate their boss will become stressed because their body is preparing for a fight to challenge the boss, but that fight ofcourse never comes.
games like doom and quake and the like form an excellent vent for cropped up agression. instead of physically attacking one of your peers as would be the natural order of things you virtually attack a virtual peer.
your body, your hormones want to fight, but you won't let it. so if you instead fool it into thinking you're fighting you release that agression, that stress. in the olden days people used to go to the gym and run around or beat up a defenseless punching bag. nowadays adolescents go on the net and virtually beat up a virtual opponent. but the principle is the same.
imho keeping children FROM those kinds of games is harmful. they need to vent their natural agression anyway, so it's best to let them do it through a harmless computer game.
just my two eurocents ofcourse...
)O(
the Gods have a sense of humor,
Never underestimate the power of stupidity
To err is human, to moo bovine
But you wouldn't have access to only bananas. You would have everything you have today, except guns (or actually legal access to guns, making guns illegal will not make it impossable for someone who is willing to break the law once they get a gun to break a law by getting one!).
So you can cut down on shootings, but you would get more stabbings and more bombings. In fact if the disturbed killers from this most recent incident had skipped the guns entirely and just used the large bombs they got into the school kitchen they would have killed 100s of people. (they apparently set them to go off a few days later, I assume they thought people would have returned to classes by then).
Maybe you would reduce the killings that number in the tens, but would the killers (that you claim will allways be with us) start killing with crossbows and knives (which I assume would kill maybe half as many people), or would they use homemade bombs, fuel-air-munitions, or poison gas (ever wonder what you can buy for $100 at a pool supply store?), which may actually kill many many more then the guns we have now?
It's actually been proven in case after case that where there is a higher gun ownership per-capita, crime rates are lower. I guarantee that if all the students and teachers in the school were packing lead. This situation would not have happened or at least fewer fatalities would have occurred. I guarantee that if or when an armed assailant breaks into your house in the middle of the night that you'd wish you had a semi-automatic handgun to defend yourself and/or your family instead of a bolt action or a baseball bat.
They didn't, actually. That's a modern interpretation of "Don't create a state endorsed religeon."
Also, you're comparing the wrong thing. Average British students vs Average American students. Oh wait, these kids wern't average, were they? Before the shootings they'd be out to at least the 5% range. Afterwards they arn't even statistically valid, there are so few.
--Dan
It's not my fault I couldn't get my facts straight, I was too busy making a point.
--Dan
Check the sales figures on Doom. Check the sales figures on guns. Check the number of ISP accounts in the nation. Check the number of movie tickets sold for violent and gory movies. Check the ratings of news shows that depict graphic violence like these shootings. And finally, try telling me that in your highschool, there wern't students that were anti-social. Hell, try telling me that these are the only kids in the nation who's parents don't pay enough attention to them.
Now try telling me that a combination of these factors triggered this massacure. I need a good laugh. A good solid laugh, from the gut. Tell it to me with a straight face and you'll probably make me hit the floor.
No, there's only one reason that this happened. They were really messed up in the head. There's only one real solution to this, too: Train our schools to recognize signs that there is SEVERE trouble brewing in a small group of students.
Like Katz said: The kids know these things arn't to blame. All that blaming them does is more firmly convince the students that their government, parents and teachers are inept and stupid.
Granted, they're right on that, but it hardly helps said people in reaching the students.
Face it. I really REALLY wanted to kill some people in my school. The total assholes who caused trouble. Why didn't I? More imporantly, why didn't I, even though I played D&D (the old standby 'reason' these things happen) I played Wolf3d, I was on the internet and BBSs and liked wearing trenchcoats... and had good enough gun control to hit my target. So why didn't I, when exposed to the same factors these students were, react the same way? Why don't millions of other students also react by killing classmates?
Thats a harder question to answer. I expect people to cop out and blame guns, internet, games, movies and music... just like they always do.
--Dan
The problem is guns. Only the bad guys have them. The bad guys are going to have them no matter what kind of laws you pass prohibiting them. What would happen if the good guys had guns too?
While guns cannot be blamed as a cause, they are a gating factor in the sense that without guns you can't go on a shooting rampage.
Of course even if guns could be completely eliminated (not likely) you are still left with a person with problems who wants to go out and shoot some one, but at least they don't have a gun. Instead they will come up with something else (bombs, poisons, knives, etc.) It is interesting the way people on both sides of gun control don't seem to realize how guns relate to the crime itself. The NRA says "Guns don't kill people, people kill people", but guns enable a person to shoot some one, and therefore is an enabling factor. While the gun control nuts figure that guns are the cause when they are really just an enabling factor that doesn't do anything to address the fact that a person actually wanted to kill another person. The solution is not simple, but simple solutions is what gets politicians elected.
..how about the serbians and the wars they've waged on the Croats (state atheists), Bosnians (primarily Muslim) and Albanians (also primarily Muslim I've read). The land thing is a redherring, their concerned that the major land occupiers who aren't Serbian will Lord over the minority Serbians. Not that they ever did but....
I know it's a bit more complicated than that however you can groups some of the other reasons unde this umbrella of using religion as an excuse.
You can't really call it racial because the Croats and most of the Bosnians are the same even if the dialect or religion is different.
Speaking of religion, how about all the Muslim terrorists in N.Africa and parts of the asian pacific? Or the problems in N. Ireland where it's the Protestants versus catholics? these all have religious differences at the root of the conflicts. I'm sure people can come up with many more instances if they think about it.
...is what you're talking about I believe.
It starred Tom Hanks. yeah, it was a pretty
lousy film. Then again, it was 'made for tv'
which is never a good sign.
What on earth makes you think that someone is not going to commit murder because the *guns* are illegal. The intent to commit the murder is a pretty good indication the perpetrator really doesn't give a damn what's legal or not. "Oh, gee, I'm gonna have to call off my murder, because this gun I have is illegal". What a crock of hooey. You mention that this never happens in the UK or Canada, where gun control laws are considerably stricter. I say check your facts.
Canada, 1989A gunman, armed with an AK-47 (which is a prohibited weapon in Canada) walks into the University of Montreal's Ecole Polytechnique (U de M's Engineering school), and shoots 14 women.
Scotland, 1997 Not sure of the exact details of this one, but Tony Blair was speaking about it on television last night.
The fact of the matter is, this happens everywhere. Gun control isn't going to change it. Effective parenting is the solution, and that's still not a foolproof method. There's nothing that can prevent these things from happening. We as humans are inherently violent.
And don't presume to think I'm detached from this whole ordeal. it happened about 10 miles from where I live.
I'm not against gun control per se, but rather stupid reactionary laws to try and act as a scapegoat for something.
In the US, we have a constitutionally guaranteed right to bear arms. And there are situations where you lose some of those rights (particularly if you're a felon). I am strongly in favour of educated gun ownership and use. (if you don't know what you're doing, don't buy a damned gun, these things kill people) - luckily, the really stupid ones manage to autodarwinate themselves, making the world a safer place for democracy.
The vast majority of gun owners in the US are very vell-educated on the care, feeding, and handling of a firearm. and that makes the world a safer place. If you restrict them too much, the ones who really don't care about the legality of them (the criminals) will be armed to the teeth, while the rest of us are unarmed and defenseless in our homes. That's not a pretty picture. And that can be achieved very well with a rifle or a shotgun. You don't need a semi-automatic assault weapon to defend your home (if you can't hit the guy with the first shot, you're screwed anyway), and I don't think they need to be as common as they are. That's why gun control in Canada works. It's designed to let law-abiding citizens (such as hunters, of which there are many in Canada) own the tools they need, and keep the really nasty ones away from everybody.
Everyone is quick to blame violent video games and movies for inspiring violent behavior.
If my kid was enthralled by The Basketball Diaries or Natural Born Killers, I'd be concerned that they were relating to the characters too much. And that's where these movies have their influence. The Trench Coat Mafia didn't look to Leonardo DiCaprio's character simply for fashion sense or gun-toting bravado. In that character, they found a kindred spirit. They may have been watching a fantasy they've had many times themselves, made more real by props, squibs, and a charismatic star with the identity they felt they didn't have.
My mom has asked me many times why I like games like Half-Life, Unreal, and Jedi Knight. The answer is simple: The challenge. Yes, I'm shooting "guns." Yes, opponents are "dying," because they'd just as soon "kill" me. But I'm "killing" nobody! It's the same tumble-happy Skaarj, the same three-armed alien slave, the same faceless Stormtrooper with bad aim, again and again. Ask any of the school shooters (the ones who haven't died, that is) about what they're killing in these games, and "what" becomes "who." The black-clad assassin becomes the cheerleader who won't give him the time of day. The Skaarj is the captain of the football team who keeps pushing him around at lunch. Under the Stormtrooper helmets are the homogenized, Gap-shopping masses that serve as a constant reminder of what's wrong with their lives.
My point is this: There was already something wrong with these kids. The media may have been an outlet or a touchstone, but it has only fed a fire that already started long before.
Keith Russell
Whatever happened to peaceful coexistance?
This sig intentionally left blank.
By scapegoating the computer gaming industry (and television, movies, etc.), people are saying that these things are causing the violence. However, easy access to guns doesn't cause violence, it facilitates it. He's not blaming guns, he's just pointing out that if we had more gun control then it wouldn't have been so easy for these kids to get access to semi-automatic weapons.
-mike kania
Please explain how, exactly, "more gun control then it wouldn't have been so easy for these kids to get access to semi-automatic weapons."
If there had been more gun control in the first place, semi-automatic weapons wouldn't be produced. While I realize that the guns these kids used are illegal anyway, if they hadn't been able to get those guns, they would have easily been able to find another legal alternative. Where is the need for the civilian to have semi-automatic weapons in the first place? Do hunters need them to combat all those deer who are armed to the teeth? Do men keep them in the night stand beside the bed in order to defend their home in case of burglary?
Most of the responses to my post have said that gun control wouldn't have helped, that these kids had bombs & other implements of destruction, too. Well, that's true. I agree if someone wants to kill, he will probably find a way to do it, but if his choices are reduced, hopefully the killing would be as well.
-mike kania
I quite personally think that NO ONE should be allowed to possess a weapon except for police.
Ok, I guess that's what I was trying to say in the first place, and it got blown out of proportion by people wondering about my definition of semi-automatic weapons (which, I must admit, I had always assumed were on a line with fully automatic weapons. Not knowing this doesn't make me "sadly misinformed," it just means I'm not as up on guns as some of you are) or trying to defend their right to bear arms. Anyway, thanks for putting it so concisely..
-mike kania
Some things about me may surprise you, though. I began working professionally in the information technology industry as a web site programmer when I was 18 and I bought my first house the following year. I dropped out of college when working full time, going to school full time and remodeling my house (I did the work myself) became too much. Almost all of my computer knowledge is self-taught - I've taken only one computer course titled "3-D Animation"; a topic entirely unrelated to the field in which I work. I am now employed by Bank of America [formerly NationsBank] as a Web Server Administrator (i.e. Webmaster) in Chicago. I have never taken an illicit drug of any sort, including marijuana. I don't, nor have I ever, smoked and I've never been drunk. I own two cats. I get along with my parents now, though there were some tough times during my teenage years.
What's more, I still have piercings, still have tattoos, and still dress weirdly. Often, people don't want to sit next to me on the elevated train. However, I am fortunate to have found an employer who doesn't care about any of that. I do my job very well, and that's what matters. It doesn't bother me that security sometimes follows me in stores, nor does it bother me that I'm usually accosted by the on-site security people who don't know me if I come in to work on the weekend. Of course it would be nice to not be bothered sometimes, but I don't expect that to happen. If it really bothered me, I'd buy clothes at Abercrombie and become another drone. That's not very likely to happen, because I'm quite definitely not a drone.
By the way, I've also never killed anyone. I don't plan on killing anyone. In fact, I've never been in a fight, unless you count that time in grade school when a kid named Eric hit me in the face (That's all that happened - I lost).
Why should you care about any of this? Because I can feel a backlash coming against kids who are different. Of course, some people are disturbed, but the exceptions to the rule are the disturbed people you can pick out of the crowd. Jeffrey Dahmer looked normal, and so did Ted Bundy and John Wayne Gacy. Just because a person finds comfort in the stylings of a group that is not in the majority does not mean they should be persecuted. All great things happen from exceptional people - we, as a society, need to recognize that 'exceptional' doesn't necessarily, or even usually, match the status quo called "normal". I need not expound on the overwhelming examples of people and their followers who strayed from the majority - Ghandi, Jesus, Mohammed, Buddha, Martin Luther King, Jr., Galileo, and hundreds, and perhaps thousands, of others.
Yes, of course parents and teachers should be aware of any pendulous behavioral swings or signs of acting out violence, but they should also take care not to attack kids simply because they don't look like they looked when they were that age. Some kids like to and will look different or weird. I like to look weird, too, and so do many of my friends and associates.
Hello. A lot of people, friends and co-workers, call me Boinger - My family calls me Jeff.
"The Constitution admittedly has a few defects and blemishes, but it still seems a hell of a lot better than the system we have now."
Send your friends messages of love at fuck-you.org
I think all the gun grabbers should head right up
there. It seems such a lovely quiet place.
Socialized health care, heavy taxes. Why work
me over, ban my guns, and get yourself generally
in a tizzy over my rights when you can emigrate
to a country which is exactly how you like it?
And it's not even necessary to learn another
language! Quebec won't do, those Quebecois are
as bad as those right wing gun nuts sometimes...
-k
Me? Attitude?
I'm one of that awful 'minority' you so blithely refer to in your monologue.
You really have no idea why we detest people fighting against our rights? Those enumerated in our Constitution? Give me a break!
Maybe it has something to do with our roots. We cut away from Britain and the king, where you were perfectly happy with a monarchy. All men created equal or something along those lines. Are you the equal of your queen? Why don't you ask her!?
Now, Canadians, they don't have any attitude _at all_, do they. Except that every self-admitted Canadian on this list has a slew of ways to make our country (that's the USA) like Canada. And it all has to do with guns. Who exactly has the fixation with guns?
I do not argue your assertation that the US is a land of disasterous contradictions. That is obvious to anyone with half a brain. Which is, at best, every other human.
But you don't have any room to argue against a right you have never ever enjoyed or exercised. "Bla bla you Canadians shouldn't be drinking at 18, bla, how dare you export encryption, bla bla WHINE".
Anyway, I would go right along with a registration scheme like yours if the Constitution were amended to -reiterate- that gun possession is an individual right inherent to our democracy. Really! But the left-wing gun grabbers will never bend, they are extremists as bad as the militias. No guns unless you're a cop or enlisted.
I think the NRA should suggest it and I'd go for it. Better a plan from our side than Bill Clinton or some other scumbag.
-kabloie
"An armed society is a polite society"
The problem isn't guns, the internet, taunting, white rage, or ennui. It's bad parenting. I put up with a lot of shit as an American white male growing up in an upper-middle-class suburban neighborhood. I have been using computers since age 5, BBSes since age 8, playing RPGs since age 9, and was the beleagured fat kid since age 7.
I have never shot anyone, nor have I stabbed, garotted, poisoned, run over, or in any other way killed anyone, ever. I've gotten into fights, I've even broken noses, but I've never killed, though I have wanted to in the abstract.
Where does the restraint come from? The only place I can think of is from my strong, supportive family. Maybe these poor kids didn't have the kind of love and succour that adolescents need. And it's not because you need a housewife to take care of the kids all the time (my mom worked outside the home for 30+ years and I was a latchkey kid since Kindergarten). There's something either wrong with the parents themselves, or they failed to see the rage in their kids early enough to do something about it.
Then again, there's an awful large number of stupid people on this planet, the trouble is staying out of the way of their mistakes...
I am now a successful SysAdmin and marketing manager.
Isn't that an oxymoron?
It wasn't any outside influence that made them this way. They were born with it.
I think all carnivores or omnivores are born to kill at an instinctual level. Civility and the curtailing of violent urges are _learned_, and if not learned there isn't much that the poor soul can understand besides rage and fear. Perhaps these kids had much stronger urges than the norm, or their parents didn't do enough to teach them how to deal with problems in a civil manner, but don't forget the animal within.
And I tend to believe that any law-abiding citizen without a violent or felonious criminal record should be permitted to wear an un-concealed handgun after a reasonable amount of training and licensing. Just imagine how many lives would have been saved on the LIRR if a citizen could have shot Colin Ferguson as soon as he drew his rifle.
Then what about OKC? A coupla yahoos with a van and fertilizer.. Who sez next time it isn't a military target instead of a federal building?
Necessity remains the mother of invention..
Crime rates in regions where gun posession is prevelant are pretty much never lower than regions where it is not
Can you cite a URL for this research?
are definitely the root cause of this problem, you are absolutely right.
Unfortunately, history has shown conclusively that morality cannot be legislated (the War On Drugs (tm), etc), it must come from within and from the society as a whole.
Both sides on the gun control issue need to stop stating the problem (kids - and people in general - killing others) and a *single* cause or statistic, and look at the ENTIRE issue, and ALL the facts and causes that are relevant.
Anybody can quote statistics to support virtually ANY position. Doesn't make it relevant, though.
illum oportet crescere me autem minui
Tell the million+ people who use guns for self defense each year that they shouldn't have the right to protect themselves and their families.
Yes, guns can and are used by criminals; we all know that. What most people don't know -- because the media doesn't report it -- is guns are used at least as often for self defense, by normal people. Take away that, and only the criminals will have guns.
BTW, by "use" I don't mean fire. Most criminal and nearly all self-defense use of guns involves just showing the gun or aiming it at someone. (Which is nasty enough if you've ever been on the receiving end; but a whole lot different than being shot at.)
Finally, the vast majority of scientific research that's been done finds no significant value in gun control; indeed, there is considerable evidence to show that *higher* rates of gun ownership result in less crime.
"As horrific as massacres like Littleton are, they are also extraordinarily rare. Statistically, children are more likely to have an airplane fall out of the sky and kill them than they are to be shot in school, despite the staggering amount of media coverage. "
When was the last time an airplane fell out of the sky and killed a kid that wasn't onboard?
To make matters worse, we have huge, bloated media content corporations (like MTV or Time-Warner, etc) pushing all sorts of crap and stupidity into the mainstream. This is truly horrible since the only value behind this is "how much can I make?". Since they've exhauseted all respectable avenues of approach, the only thing left for them to do is to become weirder and weirder. One wonders how many times the RIAA can raise the bar of weirdness (can they out do Marylin Manson? I'm waiting!).
They stare into this abyss and have no idea what to do. They're not intelligent enough to "bootstrap" themselves out of it (who is?), and their tutors are not even aware of the problem. The only thing left is to reject this emptiness by ending it in extreme violence. One wonders why it doesn't happen more often.
These children are so vacuous, so empty. It's telling that we (and these children) must look to "Hitler" as an example of "evil", and it's no surprise that they had an obsession with him. Have the words "good" and "evil" become so trite that we must continually turn to the greatest montster in human history for an example of evil? To use Hitler as an example of evil is pure, unadulterated hyperbole. It isn't needed, but he comes up in any discussion of evil among young people, because they have no moral grounding on which to base their judgements.
support gun control: take guns from cops
I'm an idiot? As if I care WTF the "stupidity of the day" is. I don't pay attention to that trash; but certainly you get the point.
support gun control: take guns from cops
I just spilled hot coffee on my lap. But, wait, it's not my fault that I was driving around with hot coffee in my crotch and it spilled, it's the place who sold it to me, because they sold it hot."
I'm sorry, but this pisses me off. Do you know anything at all about the case to which you refer? I doubt it. The woman wasn't holding the cup between her legs, it was in her hand. The bottom of the cup dropped out and spilled the coffee on her lap. McDonalds had gotten multiple complaints that the coffee was served too hot (~300F, I believe!) and that the cups couldn't take that temperature safely. The coffee was so hot she suffered 1 degree burns all over her lap. She initially just wanted McDonalds to pay her medical bills, after she was told that there had been many similar complaints about the heat of the coffee and the McDonalds had ignored them. McDonalds refused, so she took them to court. A jury slapped McDonalds with a huge punative damage fee, because McDonalds tried to try the woman in the press. This "urban myth" about it being her fault is bullshit.
When in danger or in doubt, run in circles scream and shout.
> I cant believe [Katz] didnt see the trap here..
/. "self-censorship" (as Katz would say) facilities a spin.
> jezus, if playing violent games such as
> "doom/quacke/etc" alleviates violent tendencies,
> then by the same token wouldnt kiddie porn
> alleviate abusive tendencies?
Uh... if I read his sexbots article correctly, he actually suggested something to that effect too; i.e. child sex robots would provide a healthy outlet for pedophiles. That was among the many things in that article that motivated me to give the
I've gotta stop clicking on Katz articles out of morbid curiousity when I'm not logged in and can see them. I don't I do him or myself any favors with my comments.
DNA just wants to be free...
-----
".sig,
But this post deals with the crux of the matter.
I was one of those kids in high school who was picked on, never had much money, was an anti-social outcast, etc. It's very easy to fall into that negative-feedback loop of aggression. (Especially at an age when one's testosterone levels are at their highest ever.) Like it or not, the intolerant social "haves" in such an environment make life a living hell for the "have-nots".
I'm shocked at how the killers in Colorado amassed such a huge amount of weaponry. I'm not surprised at their behavior though. Any kid who is constantly put down in a rigid system, and who is more at ease with being an introverted loner, is a potential time bomb.
And a particularly vulnerable one at that. I won't go so far as to cave into the hysteria about the evil media influence, but as a rule, kids in this situation are more susceptible to anything that instills a sense of belonging -- not that they would admit it -- as well as a way to vent built-up hostility. In other words, I won't go so far as to say that Marilyn Manson was a root cause of all of this, but I will say that a lack of adult involvement (or positive reinforcement of any kind) certainly convinced these kids to look for it somewhere else.. even if it meant inferring something from CDs no self-respecting adult would listen to with a gun to his or her head.
So what could have been done? IMHO, it's not the school's fault; chances are it was already constrained for resources. There's only so much a school with skyrocketing class sizes and limited (shrinking?) funds can do. Hell, educators shouldn't be forced into the role of babysitters anyway. But I think that the murderers' parents felt otherwise. They were horribly wrong.
-----
".sig,
First, forget the internet. The problems lie in the fact that parent's these days are just too damn lazy and/or stupid to pay attention to their kids. I play Unreal a lot and don't feel like going out and killing people.
The other problems? Well, it would be nice if the education systems in this country concentrated on boosting the self-esteem of kids. It seems everyone is hung up on sports (hey, many kids just aren't athletically talented!) or something else. PAY ATTENTION TO THE DAMN KIDS!!!! Even our president doesn't get it. He's allocated billions of dollars today so that schools can hire armed guards. That's about as effective as building more prisons to fight crime. It ignores the underlying problems!!
Next? The NRA. I don't give ashit what anyone says, this "organization" needs to go. They control the Congress with it's radical agenda. Take a LOOK at gun violence in this country! Open your f**king eyes, people! We have an epidemic! Countries like Japan and England have VERY strict gun laws. You better not be caught with one or you're in deep doo-doo. Most countries (smart ones...) realize that it's citizens do not need to be armed. The Constitution needs to eliminate this antiquated amendment.
And look who's heading up the NRA! That stupid old fool, Charlton Heston. This bozo said if the school had an armed guard, there wouldn't have beem a problem. I would like to have seen his face when he was informed that there were, in fact , two. Great solution, assh*le.
Anyway, my point is that we are going to hell in a handbasket. The rest of the world looks at us in absolute disbelief. Can you blame them? We are an advanced society? yeah.... right. It's the constant sensationalism these cases generate. The ease of gun access. The trash that exists in this country. The lack of understanding and intelligence in the education systems. Etc. The quality is going down and the kids are being taken down with it. No one is adressing the problem of growing anger and conscience-less kids growing up in the US.
God help us all.....
End of rant.....
However, I consider myself to be a reasonably-balanced individual. I don't count myself as "normal", either; I have some wacky outlooks on life, a vicious sense of humour, but I can't ever see myself going out on a killing spree. It violates what I consider to be my outlook on life; "do what you want as long as you don't hurt others" (hurt in this sense is both physical and mental).
In my case, these violent games (both computer and RPG) are my way of letting off steam. If I feel tense, I'll go shoot some strogs or hack at some orcs. More often than not, I'll thrash out a few tunes, playing along to Metallica or Iron Maiden on my guitar. If I didn't have these outlets, I'd probably end up hitting someone because I was so full of tension. Go figure.
The AD&D "satanic" link is, IMHO, total BS. I remember hearing about it when I was about 18 and couldn't see the link. It had never occured to me that RPG's could be linked to satanism, but some people object to them. I happen to have two good friends who are both Christians, both of whom have played AD&D (one only started recently, as it happens). Neither view the game as corrupting them in any way.
Unfortunately, people often look for something to blame after these incidents. I guess it's a natural way for people to deal with it. What many people ignore is the cause and effect; was DOOM the cause of the violence, or did the violent personality lead to them playing DOOM? There may be a link, but what caused what?
--
They are also for DEFENSE. They are standoff
weapons, the same way a main gauche/dagger
would be used in a sword fight.
This anti-constitutional crap about keeping
arms out of the hands of honest citizens is
nothing short of authoritarian bullshit. The
first step in America's descent would be the
attempted banning of firearms.
Read a little history, and the US constitution.
Read what the Founding Fathers wrote in regard
to both free speech and our right to defend
ourselves.
People that claim that there will never be an
authoritarian threat on our own soil need to
very carefully look at history. As a number of
people have pointed out, Hitler was elected to
office, but then SIEZED power. WE MUST NOT LET
THAT HAPPEN HERE. The first defense against that
is our First Amendment, the right of free speech
and assembly. The way that we assure we have that
right is by the Second Amendment, which gives us
the right to defend ourselves, as citizens, against
potential tyrrany.
On top of that, as has been pointed out, illegal
possesion of firearms, explosives, and even chemical
and biological agents, will continue. There is
nothing that can be done, legislatively, about
people who willfully break the law. Punishment
after the fact is enough of a deterent for most
people, but not those who have decided that it is
worth dying for, so we, as ordinary citizens have
both a right and a responsibility to protect ourselves.
Yes, the rash of school shootings suck, but banning
guns is not the solution, it will lead to much
greater problems.
Anyway, in Canada and the UK, the materials for
building pipebombs are most definitely available.
gigantino.tv - Heavy but weighs nothing.
I've yet to see anyone to take on the bigger problems in this case. How easy was it for these kids to get automatic weapons? How could they build a massive arsenal of guns
and bombs with no one (parents, friends, teachers) noticing? Why did their classmates insist on tormenting and teasing them?
I couldn't have said it any better. everyone is out trying to blame the internet, kids,parents.. no one is even thinking of the question of how these kids got these guns. Why ? because if they do. the finger points right back at themselves. Because so many of them voted to allow guns, so many of them still support the right to bear arms.
and these same people want the violence turned down ? why ? it's typical american attitude. they want everyone else to change, except themselves.
same thing with the nukes.. all the other countries can't have nuked. but we can. what kind of treaty is that ?
judging by american politics, the argument of americas politicians being stable and focused is crap. they are focused on only one thing and thats more power. they could care less about anything else.
AD&D is still taking blame for things, (though I find that many of my co-workers associate "AD&D" with "orgy", don't ask me why...) and Magic: The Gathering is still considered satanistic to many. Heh, trying getting through a catholic school playing those, not to mention when yer the only geek in the school. =)
;)
Nother thing that cracked me up is I remember in HS when "jocks" and "preps" were generally annoying and made comments, teachers didn't do anything about it, but when the UN*X or VMS geek said something back? Heh, you'd get written up or sent to the office or your guidance counselor.
Too much sterotyping and judgmental decisions being made in my opinion. Course, s'my opinion, feel free to share your own or flame mine or talk about cheese, etc.
To any geeks in HS that are ridiculed by inconsiderate jerks:
Just think, ye'll me making their salary several times over more than likely.
If this kind of willful blindness isn't the sort of thing that makes you want to throttle someone, I don't know what is.
What other experiences did you have? ...No, wait, let me describe them for you, because I probably had them, too.
How close was I?
Schwab
Editor, A1-AAA AmeriCaptions
Hey there fellow Slashdot readers did you know that Slashdot's improved preferences allow you to make this site "tag line" compliant?
;)
Why yes, Slashdot's preferences allow registered users incredible personalization, check it out now my funk soul brothers!
I can finally remove Mr. Katz's time-magazine-like puke-- thank you Slashdot, thank you! Now Slashdot's site will be 100% compatible with it's tag line:
new that nerds. stuff that matters.
And ya' know, Slashot may just want to keep Katz as an excellent incentive to motivate ppl to register! now if they could only allow me to get him out of the 'features' section... i just may give out my zip code for that...
Are you part of a well-regulated militia?
Most likely yes, if the AC in question is your average /. reader. When the Consitution was written the militia was considered to be all able-bodied men of age to serve. There was no such thing as the National Guard.
Why does Canada also have much lower murder rates? Compare the statistics between Seattle and Vancouver sometime.
If you look at the non-gun murder rate in Seattle and compare it to the entire murder rate for Vancouver it will likely still be much higher. Now compare the murder rate Seattle to a similar town in Switzerland where most houses contain fully automatic assault rifles and the like. Seattle's murder rate is going to be much, much higher.
Try reading David Kopel's The Samurai, the Mountie, and the Cowboy: Should America Adopt the Gun Controls of Other Democracies. You'll find out that murder rates have a lot more to do with economic and cultural issues than the availability of firearms.
Think how different the situation at Littleton, CO would have been with a couple of well trained gun owners incapacitating the killers.
It's happened before. The school shootings in Pearl, Miss. was stopped by an assistant principal when he retrieved a handgun from his car and disarmed the shooter.
The Colorado Senate was debating a concealed carry law just this week, but it has been shelved since the tradgedy in Littleton. Of course, the law (like most other CHL laws) had a provision to prevent concealed carry on school property. How much you want to bet the CHL law won't pass at all now?
you mean like "A gun in the home is X times more likelyto be used on a fammily member than on an intruder"
Man, that study was so bad, I can't believe it actually was accepted into the New England Journal of Medicine.
When John Lott looked into those statistics he found that they didn't even ask if it was the gun kept in the home that was used. He found that no more than 4% of the killings could be attributed to the gun kept in the home.
A previous poster said that guns should be heavily regulated because they serve no other purposethan killing. I agree with that fully. Some people may be using firearms for sports, but the primary goal of firing a gun is still killing. We don't need to be able to kill (and if I remember correctly, the law even prohibits it in most countries ;). So why should a normal person be allowed to carry a gun?
How about self defense? The police in the US aren't required to protect you from criminals. Most times they only arrive in time to clean up the mess. And, unfortunately, there are cases in this country where you need firearms to protect yourself from the police.
Yes, handguns, assault rifles and the like are designed for one thing: causing phyiscal harm to human beings. But causing harm is sometimes necessary. In the US we have a right to self defense (and here in Texas, we have a right to defend our property.)
Before you flame read on. I think the framers of the Constitution simply couldn't comprehend what some laws might come to mean in the future. I would seriously doubt they would haveadvocated regular citizens owning enough firepower to blow up a school. Remember what a gun meant in those days, a musket, with a reloading time of what, a minute or two? Contrast that with what we have today and there is a change in weaponry power of such a magnitude that no ruler in his right mind would allow a normal citizen to own it, much less have a guaranteed right to own it.
A musket was top of the line military hardware back in the 1760s. And I think they knew exactly what they were doing.
Funny you should mention that no ruler in his right mind would allow a normal citizen to own it. That's just what the Second Amendment was designed to prevent. The former colonies fought hard for their freedom and the Second was part of the designed as a way to fight to keep it, from all enemies, foreign and domestic.
This type of school shooting by kids didn't happen 50 years ago in this country and there was very little regulation of guns back then. Something has changed in America's culture so that kids see shooting everyone in school is now an option. I think the efforts to remove God and morality from public life and replace it with moral relativism and Darwin has caused everyone to become more selfish and disrespectful of others lives and property.
It is much easier today to get fuel for antisocial feelings/behavior in movies, music, and yes, the Internet. When God has been removed from public society, people then consider themselves as gods. People determine their own behavior and right/wrong based on their feelings and ideas and desires. I think these kids decided to get some revenge and fame and had no thought for other peoples lives. Other people were expendable.
For whatever reason, and influenced by our culture (but not guaranteed by it) they chose to do evil. Lots of people choose to do evil no matter their upbringing, bank account, family life, or favorite music.
Your password has expired, please login to change it.
OK, look at Mexico. Gun control there is even stricter than in Canada, and yet the gun-crime rate is about eight times higher than in the U.S.
Look at D.C.; it has the strictest gun control in the U.S.... and the highest murder rate.
Another factor to remember: About thirty bombs were found, but only four guns, and of those, one is flat-out banned in the U.S. and the other three are rifles, not hand-guns. Oh yeah, kids can't have guns anyhow.
One of the bombs was made from a 30-pound propane tank. Why aren't you whining for L.P. tank control?
Gun control not only isn't a solution, but in the case, is completely moot. The problem is socialization of fledgeling adults, not guns.
i read an article just the other day (on the msnbc site, i think) that said one of the kid's fathers actually tried to intervene. supposedly, when the news of the shooting first broke, he called police thinking his son might be involved. he offered to help try to calm his son down; the cops refused.
this makes me think that at least this boy's parents were well aware of his problems, and were probably trying to help him. but you can only guide and protect your kids so much. and for the times when you can't watch over and protect and guide them, you have to hope that they've been listening. when you turn your back, just for that one moment, you have to hope that they don't fall back down.
unfortunately, from personal experience, you can't tell whether or not they'll be able stand in those times that you can't hold them up.
(that was rather abstract and perhaps too metaphorical, but what can you do)
"onward!" cried the copper man, little knowing brass corrupts...
Wasn't the kid's father a marine? No amount of gun control would have kept the guns out of that house. Where the gun control is necessary is in the house, not at the store.
wow, that's a generalization if i ever saw one. come on, i know plenty of people in the military who don't have guns in their homes.
"onward!" cried the copper man, little knowing brass corrupts...
first, i don't think it's ever too late to try to help someone.
second, who said the kid made the bombs in his garage? it's easy enough to find a place out in the woods to do that stuff. cover it up with trash bags to keep it dry, and no one is the wiser.
third, they were semi automatic weapons, which are _not_ illegal. buying ammo is _not_ illegal. and who said they were purchased anyway.
(also, it's easy enough to convert many a semi-auto to full auto with off the shelf parts)
bottom line, some people are just determined to do some screwed up things, and no one can stop them. but you shouldn't abandon the prospect of helping them. it's too easy to blame the parents. but it's also the fault (to some extent) of the bullies, the teachers, the friends, and ultimately, it is the fault of those two kids. pointing fingers isn't going to solve anything.
"onward!" cried the copper man, little knowing brass corrupts...
you've taken my comments out of context, and misinterpreted them. you sort of missed the point.
"onward!" cried the copper man, little knowing brass corrupts...
If taking guns out of the hands of law-abiding citizens is going to reduce the type of crime that we've witnessed in Colorado, then why is it that in the HOMICIDE TABLE does Israel come in last with a total of 8 homicides/year? This, in a country where almost half the population is armed.
After having lived in the middle-east for over 2 years (in Haifa, Israel) I never heard of any child showing up to school and blowing away his fellow students and teachers with daddy's (or mommy's) M16.
This isn't a gun issue, it's a cultural issue. Many children today have absolutely no respect for their parents, teachers, even each other. This needs to be corrected if we as a country are to survive.
Of all of these people, I can recall one guy who took the games WAY too seriously. He had basic problems with reality, competition, and anger management. Nothing that could be caused by AD&D, Doom, TV, etc, but you could see it as a symptom of the real problems he had. If it wasn't AD&D that caused him to hit walls, it would have been Monopoly or something else.
The unstable are... UNPREDICTABLE and in order to ensure that they don't lose it, you'd have to remove all stimuli just in case. MMMmmmmmmmm boring for the rest of us.
--- http://foo.ca
Mr. Clinton was in Virginia at a public school yesterday. He said: "We should strive to resolve conflict without violence." Hmmmm.... Balkans? Iraq? Panama? Granada? El Salvador? Honduras? Nicuragua? Angola? Vietnam? Korea? The list goes on. I do not want to place blame for the events in Colorado on the Executive Office, but in a time when the capitol of "the greatest nation on earth" is also the murder capitol of the world governed by a crack smoking mayor (well, not any more), while in a time of continued international conflict we turn and look at an isolated violent episode and say "shame". I am not surprised by what happened. We are headed into a time of greater turmoil. New York city was boasting that it would have "less than 2000" murders by year end and they were pleased!!! There are cities around the world that have less violence by population than cities in the US. I am thinking about moving to Iceland.
pronoblem
As someone that experienced much the same environment in high school I think I have a better understanding of these boys than I might otherwise have.
First some background.
I grew up in a rural (very rural) community (pop. 2000). In my high school there were some things that were accepted as the norm, and if you weren't a part of those things, you were excluded and looked down upon. Those activities were, athletics, drinking, and that was about it. Well I wasn't in sports, I didn't (and still don't) drink, I was heavily into computers, thought gaming was the greatest thing ever, and I took all the "hard" classes. Not exactly a recipe for social success in Podunkville, USA. Now it is normal for people to want to be accepted, and I was no different in high school, but I didn't feel that acceptance was worth abandoning what I found fulfilling.
Still, I had a lot of anger towards my classmates, and with a few incidents happening differently, I might have wound up a statistic like the boys in Littleton. Access to guns was no problem, I had been shooting them since I was 9, and my father trusted me to be responsible with them. I collected knives, swords, and other assorted weaponry, and upon occasion even carried them to school.
What was the difference then?
I have to say that it was my parents. They gave me the attention I needed and the acceptance I required, while teaching me the values, and principles that showed me how to work through my anger without expressing it in a way that would cause injury to others.
A big part of that was my father instilling in me a bone deep respect for what guns can do, and the habits that are required for their safe operation. The first thing he taught me was that guns are not toys and should not be viewed that way. I firmly believe that everyone should be taught gun safety, and if everyone was, there would be a lot less accidents where someone gets hurt.
Now with the Littleton boys, I'm sure that their parents are probably going to blame the games, the internet, the alignment of the stars at their birth, and maybe even break out the lawyers for a lawsuit, but I think they are mainly to blame. The anger that these boys held wasn't caused by any of those things. They merely provided an outlet (ultimately an inadequate outlet) for them to express their anger.
So where did this anger come from?
Like me they wanted acceptance, and they didn't get it. Perhaps they were more persecuted than me, or maybe they just didn't handle it as well, but either way it made them angry. Judging from what I've been able to glean from the media, I'd say their families are pretty well off (driving a BMW to school?), which tells me that the odds of their parents being very work-centric are good. So maybe their parents didn't give them the attention they wanted, this could add to the anger that they had from being ostracized.
As I look at the aftermath of the shootings I wonder.
Where were their parents when they were gathering their weapons, and building their bombs? Building bombs, especially in the quantity they had, is not something that is accomplished quickly or easily. I heard one report that the neighbors complained about the noise they were making in the garage (presumably while they were making the bombs). If the neighbors could hear them it's reasonable to assume so could the parents.
What saddens me is that the boys were by all reports very bright, and could have been very successful if they had been able to deal with their anger. If someone would have taken the time to instill discipline, values, and a sense of self-worth in these boys, and give them the validation that they desired, they and 13 others would most likely not be dead right now.
Today I can look back on high school and see that it made me a stronger person for the adversity that I endured, but it could have all too easily have broken me.
I find it tragic that this happened, but an even greater tragedy would be if no lessons are learned from it.
As parents, it is their duty to make sure that the kid stays out of trouble....so I don't see anything wrong (ethically) in going through their kid's personal stuff (in their presence)...but that they have to do this reflects, IMHO, a lack of communication and understanding between the child and its parents.
I remember being a real trouble kid at school -- mainly bcoz the stuff they were teaching seemed too easy and useless and there was no means available to channelise my hyperactivity and curiousity. Still, I don't remember my parents ever insisting to go through my personal belongings. But they would always know if I got into some sort of trouble....this was possible coz the lines of communication always remained open between me and my parents. They would tell me where I was going wrong but they also helped me get through the bad patches....perhaps it was the result of their respect of me as a private individual, that helped me to take responsibility for my actions...and ultimately had me straightened out.
I hate to say this, and I KNOW people out there will find me sick... but I think the only way to stop these killings and hate crimes is to abolish Nazi groups (skinheads, kkk, etc) and kill on sight... which, imho, is what any Nazi deserves. As for random school shootings: In my old middle school in San Antonio, one officer was placed in the school... because he was there, all weapons were confiscated before they could be used... and if they had one cop at Littleton, I am almost certain none of this would happen (first, the higher fear of capture... second, a cop is trained to know the sounds of explosions, therefore reacting when the first pipe bomb detonated he could have shot both those losers down and everyone would be fine.
jgeo@leenux.com
John Georgelas jgeo@leenux.com "Pity the meek, for they shall inherit the earth."
that is new to me... i live in the springs, didn't get that bit of detail... well then, i improvise... according to the size of the school, a certain number of officers should be assigned :)
John Georgelas jgeo@leenux.com "Pity the meek, for they shall inherit the earth."
Ironically, one way to force somebody to take responsibility for their actions is to sue them. The usual suspects are the parents, schools, local government, and police. In most cases, the parents don't have enough money to make it worthwhile. For the others, it is somewhat difficult to document that the schools, gov, or police showed gross negligence.
Hence, as a recent case(s) has shown, the victim's families then go after the folks with the deeper pockets. The targets are the recording, movie, and computer game industries. The press then reports this, thereby creating a lot of "debate" about the negative effects of things like Doom and slasher movies. What the press then fails to mention is that these targets were chosen because they have lots of money.
I agree with your general premise that a big problem is that nobody is willing to take responsibility for their actions. However, the threat of a lawsuit has a chilling effect on those who would be willing to apologize and to accept blame. This vicious circle must be broken if a meaningful solution to these types of problems is to achieved.
Domestic crime (in the Western sense) is not considered a crime in most Asian societies. What goes on at home is no one's business. Example, several years ago one of my neighbors was beating his wife. I called the police and when they came they almost took ME in. I was told quite bluntly to mind my own business. The wife was pissed too because I made her "lose face".
For a first hand account, read the court statement by mass murderer Charles Ng's father.
I would have to say parents need to teach there children to respect the rules not the punishment. You mention cable: My family had cable in 1980. I am now 21 so most of my life I had access to HBO etc. Quite simply I didn't watch it if my mom told me not to. I can count the number of time I watch prohibited tv: 1 - I watched alians on HBO, 2 - I used to watch MTV (total about 10 times) 3 - I watched 2 or 3 simpson episodes.
I was not supposed to watch these shows an I knew it. 99% of the time I followed the rules. I never got caught for breaking them but I knew it was wrong and didn't do it.
I would have to say you are FLAT OUT wrong. As an moderatly good 1st person shooter player I can tell you the best players learn the best STRATAGIES for the games they are playing. When and where to hide. How to goad certain types of enimies into making a stupid move. It can be very strategic. (I say this becuase as far as reaction speed I'm kinda slow but I have beaten doom, quake, quake II, shogo, and unreal.) As far as a sensitive topic hell yes it is. I was very much one of those kids peers a few years ago. I roleplayed listened to allsorts of goth and metal music, I wore a black trechcoat (I have owned 3 of them!) and I hacked computers for fun. And I didn't fit in. Luckly I moved to a highschool where jocks didn't pick on smart kids or anyone else. I did move to a podunk town but it was a town that wants to not be a podunk town.Full of people who respect each other even if they don't like each other. (While I was in school we only had 1.5 fights a year.)
As to sorting this out, what the hell do you think Katz was doing. I watched CNN yesterday evening and the local news, all they talked about was the stupid fact that the kids played DOOM. Except on thing slipt out, they interviewed a close friend of the shooters. She talked about 2 boys who used doom as an outlet, away to escape from the horrors of being humiliated and picked on at school. She cried for them and morned there loss as well as the people they killed.
I can say I feal very sorry for ALL parties involved in this tragidy that includes the shooters and there friends not just the victims of the shooting.
Religion has killed and will kill more people than armed teenagers ever will.
Help fight continental drift.
Access to guns allowed these kids to do this.
Fifty years ago, you could buy a gun for ten bucks through the mail, yet kids weren't going on rampages.
Access to information about bombs allowed these kids to do this.
Fifty years ago, you could buy dynamite in the hardware store, yet kids weren't going on rampages.
Social pressures/hardship made these kids do this.
Fifty years ago, racial segregation was the norm in many parts of the country. During the Great Depression, alot of truly grim things happened. Yet, kids weren't going on rampages.
So, what has changed?
I remember my father talking about growing up in the Thirties. I remember the stories about moldy vegetables, about his father poaching deer to keep the family alive, about pulling an abcessed tooth with a string and the front door because there was no money for a dentist, about what having different colored skin than the majority meant. Yet, I don't remember any tales of violence beyond schoolyard fights. I don't remember hearing about anyone ordering a pistol throught the mail, or dropping $2 at the store for a couple of sticks of 80%, and doing someone else in.
Maybe if we start looking at the differences between the way we are now, and the way we were, we can find what is wrong.
--------------------
Earth first? Oooh, and I was thinking of paying the rent.
you are correct - how quickly ppl forget history...
Have you seen Ironstayn vs Supergovernment yet?
Chris, I have no idea what this post means. My writing hasn't changed a bit from Hotwired to here, and the only experimenting I've done is learning Linux, an ongoing but satistfying drama.
I just take one subject after another and toss it out for discussion. I suspect the difference is that you're just busier...your choice. But I haven't altered my style or approach at all, alas. Couldn't if I wanted to. Anyway, thanks and take care.
jonkatz@slashdot.org
There were lots of smart user comments yesterday, but I'd have to say the column speaks for itself. From the response here and via e-mail, people sure seem to want to talk about it.
jonkatz@slashdot.org
For most of my life, I've been a complete advocate of gun bans. But writing online has put me in touch with a lot of thoughtful, smart and very persuasive gun owners who have challenged me to think a bit more deeply about the issue. I can't imagine any reason for anybody to own machine guns, or for them to be legal, yet it is true that there isn't much of a correlation between the number of guns in a community and the amount of crime. In urban areas in particular, where there are lot of guns lying around, police have drastically reduced crime by means other than gun control.
I still have trouble with the idea of a nation as heavily armed as this ones, but I have a lot of gun-owning online friends, and I have to say, they have made me think harder about this issue.
jonkatz@slashdot.org
P.S. I've been writing about Microsoft (and sexbots, for that matter) for nearly 10 years. Why would you describe that as an "experiment.?"
jonkatz@slashdot.org
You are quite right. I didn't have the guts,and I do believe they are good, as a newcomer to Quake, and a happy newcomer, and somebody who has a lot of friends who game, I do think they are good. And unconsciously, I was afraid to say it, I guess. Good call.
jonkatz@slashdot.org
I think this is an important question. We don't really know anything about these kids parents, but from what I've read about most of the others, there weren't any obvious reasons in the family life why this would happen. Maybe there is a violent gene of some sort?
jonkatz@slashdot.org
Statistically, children are more likely to have an airplane fall out of the sky and kill them than they are to be shot in school, despite the staggering amount of media coverage.
I'd sure like to see the data to back that up.
I think quake is a great game, and don't think you can blame what happened on it, but I can't help thinking that it may have had to do with the way it went down. Running around in halls and shooting whoever was in site and refilling on ammo they'd stashed around the building. Sounds familiar. I dunno. In principle my feeling is that stimuli shouldn't be censored, that wide open and absolute free-speech is the best policy, but in practice it doesn't always seem so healthy. I don't have the faintest idea on how how to deal with it- I guess it starts with the parent.
I've liked some of mr. Katz's writing but this piece didn't tell us anything any of us don't already know and offered nothing helpful to a community that's pretty freaked out by what happened. Hell, everybody is. To title the piece Why Kids Kill and go on and do nothing but discount what the talking heads are saying about it seems in opportunistic and in poor taste.
The ONLY rights children have are the rights ADULTS LET them have. Period. There has been too much freedom for little wombats and you all think that you are "young adults". Not so.
If anything good can come from such a tragedy, it will be the liberal adults losing influence and the heavy hand of discipline lowering the boom on all of those so called "young adults" in the US public schools. I'm for uniforms, buzz cuts, and a drill instructor with a horse whip in every class.
You realy want that ??
The kids wil win, you know that don't you ??
Besides, thay will stop trusting you !
Is it worth it ??
echo '[q]sa[ln0=aln80~Psnlbx]16isb572CCB9AE9DB03273snlbxq' |dc
Almost every kid goes through a period (or even periods) in their teenage years where they feel unloved and unwanted. I'll go out on a limb here and say that this is a product of their environment (the being unloved bit) not their warped psychopathic minds. Mostly this environment improves (new friends or finally leave school and hang out with adults, whatever). Sometimes there can seem no end to the environmental causes of this "adolescent depression" (for the kid in middle of it anyway).
Sometimes they end up in such pain they take their own lives.
Often the child has identified the elements in their environment causing them pain (correctly or incorrectly). It seems that in some cases they decide to do society a favour (in their minds) by removing these elements (in this case killing the people at their school who hated them) as well as themselves.
That's what I think anyway.
john
The fact that these kids were psychologically disturbed is unquestionable, obviously. The problem here is WHY the kids are screwed up.
The media is saying that the kids watched violent movies, read nasty web pages, and played mean games. That's why they got screwed up and went postal.
No. I'm sorry, that's just wrong. Has anyone given a thought to the fact that you'd have to be pretty friggin messed up in the first place to think that pixelised enemies in a sci-fi setting where you come back to life if you die is the same as life.
If Doom was what pushed them over the edge, then they were already on the edge to begin with.
I listen to Rammstein. I play, not Doom, but Quake, Quake 2, Half-Life, far more bloody and violent games than Doom. Doom is boring, tame, compared to these. I also know how to make pipe bombs, and if I had any trouble, I could look up the info in a minute off the net. I'm also a middle-class white teenage male living in a small town who gets hassled by his peers at school.
But am I going to go loco? No. Why? Because I'm not a friggin weak-willed mindless psychotic idiot like those two were. I'm sorry, but it's the truth (IMHO).
You can't say that everyone who plays Doom or listens to Rammstein or knows how to make explosives is going to flip out. Kids who excel in chemistry would know how to make some explosives (and worse), people who like hard rock will have heard Rammstein and similar, and every avid computer gamer has played Doom. Does that mean that all these people are at risk of losing their marbles? Some perhaps, but in all likelihood, no.
Let's also question where they got the weapons. Where did they get the weapons? Who knows? Here in Canada, I couldn't get ahold of those kinds of weapons no matter how hard I tried. They just aren't available to minors. I couldn't even get a handgun. Perhaps if weapons weren't available on every street corner, it wouldn't have happened. Perhaps it would have. But it couldn't have hurt.
Anyway, it's a horrible tragedy, don't get me wrong, but let's not blame the video game creators, or the musicians, or the people who disseminate information on the internet. I live in Canada, these kids were in the States. Both are free countries, and no one forced these kids to play games or visit web sites. They used their constitutional rights, freedom of information, and common internet access to do this. No one is to blame but themselves.
~Sentry21~
There is more to it than that. People who blame
things like doom, violence on TV or sex on TV have
blinders. These things just reflect society, what
happens in society. Each of us have some anger
built in for some reason or another and as human
beings have sexuals urges just like other animals.
For most people playing violent games or watching
violent films will take care of those animal needs
for violence. It's like when I was a kid and you'd
get angry, instead of kicking someone you'd go
hit a punching bag or something. TV is a fantasy
world where you live your dreams or other people's
dreams.
I can't disagree that some of the people will
try to copy some violent images they saw on TV
or in the cinema but this is minuscule compare
to the overall population who are decent citizens.
They don't just do this because they saw it on
TV or doom but because they have some vendetta
and find ideas wherever they can find them.
It these things weren't there they'd find
something else.
I'd rather have my son play doom and get all his
anger on monsters than go out and beat the fundy
kid next door. This kid is a sweetheart who is
adored by virtually all the girls he knows.
There is no violent bone in that young man.
What a kid need is a father and a mother who
adore him and will teach him how to be a decent
person. Don't expect the society to do it for you.
When the parents aren't there expect just about
anything.
> Soldiers are trained to kill, but when
> confronted face to face with the enemy only
> about 10% fire!
thats intriguing. where do you get these stats from?
Les Schaffer
It is easy to kill when you don't see the person behind the nameless face. Basic tool of boot camp training. This is just a theory on my part, but I think the SIZE of the school has A LOT to do with it...
A teenager's #1 modus operandi is to define the self. Perhaps she comes up with a definition of herself by herself but she needs interaction on a personal and familiar level with others to enforce her own view of herself. In a freshman class of 60 (like mine was), you pretty quickly learn about everyone as individuals...it's much harder to categorize them as simply cheerleader or class-officer-geek if you have to interact with them on a personal level 7 hours a day. You're bound to see more of their idiosyncracies and they become individuals to you, whether you like them or not.
In a school of 1800 you have 460 in your freshman class...there's no WAY you're going to learn about each one by name and individual personality. They are a sea of faces to you and as such you can invent and make yourself believe just about anything you want about them..."she's rich and all the boys like her; she doesn't have a care in the world"...(which of course is never true).
State of the Art schools are great but not when it means you've got a WalMart size student body. Of course teachers, parents, other students are going to generalize and categorize, b/c that's what we all do when presented with a large group of people that we have to navigate around...
What's the point of a $12M school with state of the art equipment if you're going to just herd the kids in and out? Better there be 4 or 5 state of the art schools with TOTAL enrollment of less than 400 kids in all four classes. But it's cheaper to build one than 5, so therein lies the rub...
If nobody knows you and nobody cares who you are, how hard would it be to kill people you've objectified into caricatures of whom they really are?
My answer is smaller schools with smaller classes where a teen can not only learn but also interact with other teens...not be shuffled around and suffer the humiliation of no one knowing who you are.
---diva
diva Pasty Drone NewsTrolls, Inc.
Why do kids kill? Because if a culture tells any group, loudly enough and for long enough, that they are immoral and misshapen, then sooner or later, they will begin to act immoral and misshapen. Events like these are what our culture gets when it wages a perpetual war against the young.
Yeah, just take away the guns. And if we want to stop our kids from using drugs, we just have to ban drugs too.
HELLOOOO!!
These kids had bombs too, which I'm sure that they didn't have a permit to carry. They apparantly built the bombs themselves. If someone wants guns and bombs bad enough, they will find a way to get them.
Guns are a symptom of the problem, not the problem itself. You treat the disease, not the symptoms. I could pick up a gun, and I would have no desire to shoot someone. Most people are the same way. The problem here is that these kids DID want to shoot people. That's the problem, we are creating kids who want to kill.
Of all the comments I've ever posted, this is definately one of them
I have a friend who I noticed became very "wired" and had a desire to break things after extended Doom sessions. I think these things affect different people in different ways.
Of all the comments I've ever posted, this is definately one of them
I believe that many health departments require food to be served in the 180 degree range. I'm not sure if this applies to coffee, but it may not just be that "customers like it hot".
Of all the comments I've ever posted, this is definately one of them
Sure the kooks in Japan won't kill you on a shooting rampage, but they have been known to kill people by gassing the subways.
I don't think any country is totally immune to this sort of thing.
Of all the comments I've ever posted, this is definately one of them
You certainly can't point to any one factor for this. I believe many factors are to blame.
As for Japan and Switzerland, both are more homogenious than the US. Diversity in the US has surely lead to some tension. But that's only one factor.
Japan was heavily involved in WWII, and they've gone to war with China before that. The UK gets into virtually every war that the US does, even if they are the only ones. Switzerland has never gone to war as far as I know. As for Canada, pacifists from the US all the way back to the Revolutionary War have fled to Canada, could it possibly be that Canada has a higher pacifist population in part due to this?
One thing that I think is surely different is the way Americans view freedom. Nowadays everyone seems to demand freedom without the corresponding responsibilities. "That's my right, this is my right. I can do what I want, and you can't stop me!" I see more and more kids, even the "good ones", stand up and challange their parents this way. I'm only 20-something, and we never did that to the extent that I see today's kids doing it.
I think it would be interesting to compare the American culture with other cultures. The results could be interesting.
Of all the comments I've ever posted, this is definately one of them
Don't forget that the US has 260+ million people compared to Canada's 28 million people, so you should expect to see much more in the US.
Of all the comments I've ever posted, this is definately one of them
To all those that believe that the available of firearms had little to do with the killings, I have to ask one question...
Why hasn't there been the same sort of violent killings in Canadian and British schools?
The US is has its share of psychotics, as do we... but the availability of guns in the US allows these people to easily become killers.
If Americans would take a look around they would see that some of us have figured out the truth. The gun laws of US are part of the problem.
Complexity Happens
Yes, handguns, assault rifles and the like are designed for one thing: causing phyiscal harm to human beings. But causing harm is sometimes necessary. In the US we have a right to self defense...
I don't see the link between self defense and killing another person... that has been culturally been bred into Americans. If no one had guns, non-lethal means of protection would work fine...
Complexity Happens
King George has been dead a long, long, long time, dude. Americans no longer have British soldiers knocking on their doors.
Ammendments have been added and repealed to/from the US Constitution numerous times to maintian the overall appropriateness of the document. The first 10 amendments were named 'The Bill of Rights' out of literary flamboyance on the part of Thomas Jefferson, not out of some perceived ethical universality. In truth they're simply the first 10 (of dozens to follow) amendments.
Counterquery: Why are there no weekly massacres in my home where there have never been any firearms?
I'm not arguing either side of this issue. Rather, I'm simply pointing out issues of rationality/irrationality.
~~~~~~~~
Signature illegible, could be somebody else.
No, but people tend to argue that legality/morality somehow ought to solve the problem.
Unfortunately, this is not a moral problem. It is a chemistry problem. This country manufactures most of the armaments in the world (including your "bombs"). Given a large enough concentration of this stuff it will invitably diffuse out into the population as a whole, no matter what checks you try to put on it and statistically some will wind up in the hands of kids like this. Simple osmosis.
The only intelligent way to do gun control is to stop making the damn things.
You will not drink with us, but you would taste our steel? - Walter Matthau, The Pirates
>'guns don't kill people, people with guns kill people'. Those who want to kill will always find away.
If someone has a knife, you might be able to outrun them, but you can't outrun a bullet. Sure, people might be able to build pipe bombs, but those are carefully planned killings. USA style gun ownership makes it possible impulsive killings, like people having a bad day blowing the head off someone who cuts them off on the road.
Being bitter is drinking poison and hoping someone else will die
>"An armed society is a polite society"
A society where everyone is armed is a SCARED society. Someone who is gagged can't be said to be polite, he is unable to speak! If everyone go around with guns you have a constant threat. Maybe someone would like to say something, but the threat of getting shot keeps her silent. That is not politeness, that is intimidation.
Being bitter is drinking poison and hoping someone else will die
Katz wrote an article on Wired a while ago before this incident which dealt with gun control. I am usually very careful about saying that things are "irrefutably true" (it is so embarressing if you are proven wrong and it comes back to haunt you) but in general the article sums up quite well my views on gun control.
1 2749.html
"The media habits of these teenage suspects aren't yet clear. The common denominator linking them, to date, is quite clear: They can easily find guns. Why haven't journalists and politicians focused on this as the most pressing issue connecting these tragedies, a far more convincing common denominator than violence on TV?
We all know the answer. Because the gun lobby is too powerful, and because journalists can hide behind the comfortable ethos of objectivity, which makes avoiding the truth not only excusable but virtuous. All they have to do is make sure to quote everybody else's stalemating opinions.
When it comes to the sale and distribution of rapid-fire assault weapons, the gun lobby is our modern equivalent of Murder Inc., responsible for vast tragedy and suffering. That this is so obviously, irrefutably true, even when it comes to stopping the slaughter of helpless children, is a bloody indictment of both journalism and politics, two of our most cowardly and morally bankrupt contemporary public institutions."
http://www.wired.com/news/news/wiredview/story/
Also read:
http://www.handguncontrol.org/
Being bitter is drinking poison and hoping someone else will die
As said, outward family appearances can be very deceiving. While a work from home father may make possible the conditions for an ideal parental relationship, it doesn't mean they weren't having their difficulties. Even if you are a parent living at home you can do many things to disrupt your family. You can push your children too hard, work too hard thus ignoring family, lie, cheat on your spouse, physical or sexual abuse, drugs, alcohol, etc., etc. This can all go on under what appears to be a relatively normal family on the outside. And some of the less serious sounding ones like being a Workaholic or pushing your children too hard can sometimes be just as destructive.
Yes the kids soley hold the blame for this terrible disaster, but the parents are most assurredly guilty of neglect.
Right! specifically, we need to make it illegal for:
-minors to buy guns
-minors to buy ammunition
-anyone (except cops) to bring guns into a school
-anyone to convert a shotgun to a sawed-off
-anyone to construct pipe bombs
-anyone to commit murder
Oh, wait... all those things are already illegal. The answer is not more laws, it's more enforcment of the laws we already have.
0 1 - just my two bits
And, how do you make something like a Glock 9mm illegal when half the police forces in the country use them?
The same way you make it illegal for people to break the speed limit, or detain people against their will, but allow the police force to do these things.
They're the police - they have these extra powers which help them do their job. The police would have a hard time if they weren't ever allowed to confine people. However if you or I do that, it's kidnapping or some similar (serious) crime.
Tim
I always enjoy listening to people who are against gun control, they sound very much like the tobacco lobby trying to tell the world that smoking has not been absolutely proven to cause cancer and kill people.
People have stated that mass killings have occured in countries with strict gun laws, which is true. But, how often does it occur? For Canada, not very often. On a per capita basis, how many deaths are related to guns in countries like Canada and the UK as opposed to deaths in the US? Making guns much harder to get will not stop things like this, but it will make things like this much harder to do.
To argue that to make life safer requires arming everyone reminds me of a T-shirt I saw once, which said 'Fighting for peace is like f***ing for virginity.' If the American society would stop glamourizing weapons, and treat them as deadly tools, perhaps then people would not feel the need to carry weapons.
You don't need a semi-automatic assault weapon to defend your home (if you can't hit the guy with the first shot, you're screwed anyway), and I don't think they need to be as common as they are
:)
:) In addition, potencial owners are required to take courses on the use of all firearms, so all weapon permits carry that restriction. Hopefully the day will come when the US will take a similar stance. Perhaps not as strict, but with safety as the foremost concern.
This is an excellent point. I do not propose a total ban on guns. I realize people want to hunt, and that the vast majority of gun owners are very responsible. As was stated in the comment, I do think that the NRA fighting for the right to use semi-automatic weapons with armour piercing ammunition is a bit excessive. How many deer wear Kevlar these days?
I can also understand wanting to have a weapon for home protection, especially in certain areas. It is not safe in many places, and unfortunately, the need for such strong measures has become almost required.
Perhaps if the gun control advocates in the US would start taking a softer, well informed and well thought out stance, then they would get further. By standing up and shouting for gun control, most people in congress just seem to turn a blind eye. It doesn't help that the strongest lobby group in the US right now is the NRA.
In Canada, we do promote caution and training for weapons. In Nova Scotia, to get a handgun requires psychological counselling to find out why you want one (and you thought a 3-day waiting period was bad
I believe you have avoided the actual point. There is nothing to this article other than 'teenage violence is dropping, and educators are clueless to respond to media hype'.
This doesn't really merit the time it took me to read the article. It is also a statement which 99% of us have certainly already considered. Personally, I think slashdot should stick to linking to other people's news, rather than posting editorials.
Brian Chrisman
Quit taking the word "art" and expanding it to your propietary definations just for the purpose of criticising Katz.
I don't think JK said "art" as in graceful, classy. He meant it as a whole pasttime, a new thing. As in becoming so popular that it has its own style and following.
Chill, don't let one small thing like that upset you on the whole article.
-fresh
----------
"They misunderestimated me." --George W Bush, Nov. 6, 2000
Sometimes I wonder where the media gets off using these stereotypes -
Well, all in all the local media has done a good job covering the tragedy - except for the fact while I was there I was fighting off reporters, and photographers (mostly photographers) from Rachel Scott's car - where people more affected than me were crying etc. That didn't need to be shown on the news - and I told the cameramen that. (infact I got 2 arrested hehe).
Now don't go off that I'm against the media totally - I'm part of the media - I write for the school newspaper and I'm probably going to be a journalism major. It's the extreme stupidity and lack of judgement that gets me angry. Enough ranting... -J Hart - Junior at CHS
--onyx--
Flowers, cards etc do help the healing, and it's just the thought that someone cared enough to send SOMETHING that helps. Don't follow exactly and don't do anything... Do something - wether it is write an article and put it on the web, send money flowers whatever to someone something somewhere - someone will find out and it WILL make a difference.
-J Hart - Junior at CHS
--onyx--
Don't give me crap about how "permissive" their parents must have been. If their parents had been more permissive with their ears I doubt this sort of thing would happen. Kids learn at an early age whether their feelings matter or not; we shouldn't be surprised that those who are denied a sense of purpose at home become violent when they fail to find it from their peers.
Firearm ownership is a civil right protected by the second amendment to the Constitution of the United States. Why would you deny me my civil liberties because of the actions of others? Why not ban inflamatory speech? or just arrest anyone who might commit a crime.
If the mere availability of firearms causes crime, why has the crime rate dropped in Texas and Florida since their CHL (Concealed Handgun Licence) laws went in to effect? Why are there no weekly massecres in Kennesaw Georgia where every household is required to own a firearm?
"Heavens, it appears that my weewee has been stricken with rigor mortis!" -- Stewie Griffin
At the time the Constitution was written the term well-regulated meant working correctly. There are references to well regulated foundrys, shops etc... The term has nothing at all to do with government "regulation"
"Heavens, it appears that my weewee has been stricken with rigor mortis!" -- Stewie Griffin
Crime everywhere in the us has dropped, including areas with sane gun laws. How come there is gun deaths
So, you agree that gun control has no effect on the crime rate. After all, if it did the places with "sane gun laws" would be less crime ridden.
Back in the 1780s, when farmers with rifles...
By that logic, the only types of media protected by the First Amendment would be books and newspapers. After all, radio, TV, movies and the Internet didn't exist back then. With all the violence, hate etc... in the media today and the presumption that is causes kids like this to do these types of deeds, lets ban violence on TV, and movies and video games.
"Heavens, it appears that my weewee has been stricken with rigor mortis!" -- Stewie Griffin
Was he a student? If not, well...it dosn't count, you can't stop a crazy preson from attacking a school, but it's not a 'school' shooting, it's an assult on a school. The point is, students in Canada don't go wacko.
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
"...teenagers are alot like television sets...once in awhile they have to be whacked across the eyes with a rubber-soled tennis shoe"
I agree. Our culture is one that focuses too much on the self, rather than yielding to others. This has been weighing heavily upon my mind for years now.
Be aware of this next time you go driving. The threat of punishment for breaking laws seems to be what drives people to obey them rather than why the laws exsist. All too often people's selfish desires to reach their destination a few seconds earlier puts others in direct danger. And the offenders don't care.
In my own opinion, through my ownobservations, we as a society have become more self-centered and lazy. And thus more evil. I believe that the problem will only grow worse yet, affecting us all in sublte and not so subtle ways. People scoff at the Golden Rule and they end up stabbing themselves in the back.
What other experiences did you have? ...No, wait, let me describe them for you, because I probably had them, too.
Man. You hit it right on. Incredible.
School (up until college anyway) was pure hell. It is a shame that so many of us have to go through that.
--Dast
This sig is false.
I cant believe you didnt see the trap here..
jezus, if playing violent games such as "doom/quacke/etc" alleviates violent tendencies, then by the same token wouldnt kiddie porn alleviate abusive tendencies?
-Laxative
Overall, very nice article katz.. I have to say your social commentary is tenfold better than your analysis of the so-called "linux/geek community"
I have read a lot of the comments here, and have to say that the biggest thing I see going is a synchronized "passing of the buck" to somebody else.. or at least, rejecting one particular factor.
The gun enthusiasts say that it wasnt guns which did this. "Guns dont kill people, people kill people," and other inane phrases can be heard. No, it wasnt the guns which "caused" this incident, but then, there was no one thing that "caused" this incident - it was an unfortunate situation caused by a number of circumstances. One of those circumstances was the easy availability of guns. It plays a role, and a significant role at that.. two kids are not going to be able to kill 15 people in a school with a butter knife - at least, it would be a lot harder.
The "internet pundits" ( who are usually the gun pundits also ), say that it wasnt the internet which did this. The Internet too was a factor. The availability of easy communications channels helped these kids. For me however, the internet is quite a different case from guns because the internet's sole purpose is not to kill - unlike guns.
The gaming enthusiasts say that it is not the horrific and completely ghastly needless violence and lack of imagination present in modern 3d shooters which caused this incident. The games too played a role. One can argue wether the kids were psychotic because they played doom, or played doom because they were psychotic, but I dont think the cause-effect distinction is very meaningful here. The point is, these games reinforce generally violent tendencies in children. Some times it spills over, most of the time it doesnt.
People also blame the parents - and it's true that the parents did have a lot to do with it. So did the community. These kids are smart. Reading their website, I find it witty, in a very rabid, violent and extreme manner. They knew what they were doing and they knew what it would accomplish. They didnt give a shit about the people they killed because they beleived that the community around them didnt really give a shit about them. They just didnt care. If they were in heaven (or hell) now, they'd be laughing at our wonderful psychoanalysis of them, saying to each other "we really showed those fucks, didnt we?"
Anyway - all the above-mentioned items went into this tragedy. If we take the advice of most of the posts here, we'd just leave all of them, and incinerate the parents for what their children did (that's the impression I get anyway). Something should be done for ALL the above-mentioned subjects.. The availability of guns should be dealt with, the prescense of web-sites should be noticed, the ubiquitousness of needlessly violent 3d-shooters should be curbed, parents should be made to care, and the community should be educated.
Dont pass the buck.
-Laxative
More gun control would have prevented it!?
I've spent the past few days listening to people spew that utter tripe and I'm tired of it. Here's why.
Right now the US has the most restrictive gun control in its history. These kids got them anyway. *MORE* control will not prevent people who want guns from getting guns, only prevent people who need guns from getting guns.
If a robber came into my house right now, chances are high that the gun he has was NOT BOUGHT LEGALLY! That means the laws DO NOT WORK. More laws WILL NOT WORK. Figure it out, people!
Why do we have the 2nd amendment? Why? So kids can shoot people in the playground? NO! Want a prime example, look at Kosovo. The government targeting ITS OWN PEOPLE. *THAT* is why the 2nd amendment is there. Get rid of the guns anre you're nothing more than cattle for some 2 bit dictator to take over and exploit.
-- Grey d'Miyu, not just another pretty color.
Just ask your self the last time you heard of a school shooting in Canada.
I'm not sure what your getting at here. Guns are widely available here in Canada. Gun availablility in the USA may be higher (I don't know, I haven't spent enough time there to judge) but there isn't any lack in Canada.
I don't think anything used in this spree was illegal in Canada and not in the USA. (I.E. Everthing was illegal.) Assuming the handgun was a 9mm as reported and not fully automatic, even it would have been legal in Canada after about two weeks of paper work. However it would have been illegal for anyone under eighteen to possess it and doublely illegal to take it onto school property.
How do you expect children to grow up into normal adults when they were mistrusted their entire lives and treated like second-class citizens? If it were an employer doing that sort of thing to their staff, it would be illegal. That's as bad as sexism and racism, only in a more dangerous form. People who are shown again and again that they are not worthy of privacy and they are not trustworthy enough to handle their own affairs, or have even some semblance of a normal, respectable life, do not grow up into normal people, they grow up and they rebel, they grow up and they lose theirselves in addictive substances, or they end up causing themselves to never grow up at all.
The signature of a healthy culture is one that respects its young people for being what they are: the future. They are not subcitizens, they are as important as every adult, if not more important. You don't have school massacres occuring in countries where the children and young people are respected and treated as equals---inexperienced, perhaps, but equal nonetheless. It does not happen. If you tell a child he is stupid, he will think he is stupid; if you tell a child he is bad, he will think he is bad; if you tell a child that he is untrustworthy, he will be untrustworthy. Children are absorbent... they are what society tells them they should be. And in America... well. You see the products.
-- very concerned/opinionated 14-year-old (whose parents never snooped in her stuff)
---- My Design, Code, Ruby on Rails blog: http://www.slash7.com/
Having recently returned from a trip to Chicago which involved driving around downtown, among other places, I feel that I can safely say that It's far too easy to get a drivers liscense, so comparing that to the ease of getting a gun (I could get myself a _fully_ automatic weapon within a few days, and the feds wouldn't ever know it - even though it's illegal) is irrelevant. That said, I do think a reasonable regulation of guns is warrented. I also think there should be a penalty for breaking laws, which there really isn't.
Read what you can about the Donner party... Albert Fish... Ed Gein... and Charles Starkweather.
Nothing has changed since... and those all did their grisly deeds a long time ago. LONG before the internet or video games.
Case closed.
One bright spot on the news about this last night was the response that the local schools (Union County, N.C.) had come up with: They got some prominent members of various cliques together just to talk and to see each other as people.
While it is only a small step, and one that should have been already encouraged, it does demonstrate that there are in fact school administrators who figured out pretty quickly where the problem lay, and a reasonable response to it.
In the news coverage, they interviewed the kids, who were apparently surprised to learn that people not exactly like them were still human. I don't know how much of that was just for the interview, though. I expect they weren't that stupid before, and aren't that smart now. Still, that sort of meeting probably made a difference.
Alan R. Light
Monroe, North Carolina
Dick Cavett once stated, "I see more comedy on television than violence, but I have never heard anybody complaining about comedy in the streets."
'Nuff said
--
"May I have ten thousand marbles, please?"
So many people will look at this incident and say more needs to be done about gun control. It was used here in Colorado's Senate to argue both ways a new bill about concealed weapons. The people for the bill argued that if a teacher had a gun that day, it may have stopped quicker. People against it said the kids would never had gotten into the school with concealed weapons.
Ok, good arguments here, but what part of the attack was legal? Guns are not supposed to even be carried by anyone under 18, and also are not supposed to be around a school in this state. Extra laws are not going to help, unless there is a law about being a better parent. I'm not against children having privacy, but honestly, how did these two people get their hands on the guns that they had, and more importantly, how did they build all the bombs in their houses without the parents ever knowing?
Also people will say security in schools needs to be raised. Metal detectors would have most likely added a few more deaths to the list. Why? Assuming the school would have someone watching the metal detectors, they would have been the first targets of the two people who did the shooting. With as much weaponery as they had, all a metal detector and an average school guard would have done is told them the odvious.
Security cameras would not have helped either, as poliece response was very quick anyhow. Unless the cameras have the ability to be tapped into from the outside, they are worthless in an incident like this.
Basicially the only way to prevent something like this at a school with security is to have the type of security in place when I visited Cheyene Mountain Space Command (aka NORAD).
The media will look for anything to blame except the real causes. And what are the real causes?
1. The kids access to guns. If the weapons they had were owned by the parents, the fault falls on them. If they were bought, the parents are still at fault for not knowing their children well enough. Laws wouldn't help here, since if the guns were bought, they wern't leagal.
2. The parents lack of notice of activities by the kids. Honestly, how did the parents not know about the bombs when they were being created?
3. The kids themselves. How could anyone think that this type of violence is acceptable? And once started, why did they keep going? This incident lasted hours, not a simple gunshot.
The problem isn't the schools, the laws, the guns, or even the countries. It's the parents and how they chose to raise the kids in a way that said superficial success is the only thing acceptable. And the kids own fault for not having morals of any type when commiting this act.
And also, the overall problem is the media's over coverage without truths. So many parenst are scared that they will never see their kids again due to school violence, but as Katz said, the odds of something else happening is way higher.
Since I live so close to the incident, I get much more media coverage then most. Anyway, to get to my point, there was a police officer there at the time, as there always was. He was in the other side of this huge school, and had to be called specificially by the 911 operators to know what was going on.
We are all quick to point the finger at something else...when we should take a look at the fact that we are all to blame.
/.ers had similar experiences growing up...
Do me a favor and don't include me in your personal failings.
These kids were alienated because they were not accepted for who they were. We all judge people by their looks/music/etc...
It's possible that I might have actually gotten along with those in the "Trenchcoat Mafia" (there's a sound bite for the ages); I have similar tastes in music and video games, and probably suffered similar forms of alienation -- I was one of the "D&D geeks" in my high school.
Even those who try to be fair in not being prejudice fail. I take more notice to the more attractive girls and the others kind of fall by the wayside. I don't mean it...but I do.
It may be true that their peers (and, apparently, the faculty at the school -- what's wrong with THAT picture?) gave them a rough time, but don't assume that the rest of us would have done the same. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that many
Jay (=
And another idea. Let's ban marijuana, heroin, and cocaine. That'll really cut down on crime and keep people from getting hurt.
Wait a minute... we already did that... and it's not working too well
Let's beat KDE/GNOME war. (We ALL know Gnome sucks - do not we?)
<^>_<(ô ô)>_<^>
I don't understand the argument for more gun control here. The kids at that colorado highschool were already breaking something like 19 laws (I haven't verified this, just heard it on CNN).
So, um, I guess 20 laws is the magic number then? If we had only enacted one more law then this tragedy wouldn't have occured? I say bullsh*t.
I wonder how many people would have been hurt or killed if a couple of the good-guys had guns in that situation. I personally think it would have been less.
--bricktoad
My friends, we are nothing but wings on the chicken of society.
Why did I post that crap? I'm just sickened by the gun nuts making political capital out of the grief of these families, and I responded with satire.
We need more people like you.
Of course, some nut'll probably take the numbers in your original post as gospel, and before you know it it WILL be official NRA statistics...be afraid...
Aren't you dead?
okay, you hit a raw nerve with the single parent thing, i grew up and matured more after my mom divorced my dad and we moved away than i did before. No my dad didn't abuse my mom, they just didn't get along (at all). so you can't say that all double parent households are better than all single parent house holds.
I don't know if this was intentional or not, but I found it mildly irritating that the subject of this thread has JUST the word "mothers" and not "fathers".
I *did* notice that the text of the message was "gender-fair" and mentioned parents most of the time.
It just makes me wonder sometimes... In a world where more often than not, both parents have to work to be able to pay all the bills, why are mothers more often held accountable for the actions and welfare of the children than fathers are?
(I'm not as upset as I might sound... just trying to make a point).
I agree. The important thing is that the parents treat the children as important and pay attention for danger signs and crys for help... Most children *do* show signs of one or the other when they need attention.
A bigger problem is parent who have children and for one reason or another, obviously really don't WANT them. Parents who, more often than not, use the television or nintendo as a baby-sitter. I have seen many who (as someone stated above) treat their children more like roommates than their wards.
I prefer the idea of one parent at home for the first year or so - if possible. But if necessary (for financial OR personal happiness) I believe both parents can work and still have time to be good parents to their children.
I personally come from a mixed-environment. There were times when my mother stayed at home and times when both parents worked. Durring the ages that I can remember, I don't mind that my mother worked - both parents were home by 6:00 and both paid LOTS of attention to us in the evening and on weekends - in fact, my parents seldom did anything without us! I beleieve that kind of attention is what is important!
However, Switzerland's gun laws are very lax, and yet I haven't heard of any massacres there recently. Wasn't it illegal for them to be carrying the guns (my knowledge of US gun law is patchy 8-))?
Oh my God, I sound like a spokesperson for the NRA. Was it them who suggested that if *everybody* had a gun, then this wouldn't have happened? MAD for the Millenium, baby 8-)!
You're right about responsible parenting. And I'd lay money that neither of those two boys had a father at home to keep an eye on them. But you showed incredible naivete when you said:
You shouldn't be asking where these kids found out how to do all of this stuff, or what violent acts sparked their imaginations.
Bullshit! To ask such questions might be inconvenient for you, because you behaved like a shithead when you were a teen. But all avenues of investigation are legitimate in this inquiry.
Just because the know-how didn't lead to the act in your case doesn't mean it never does. Someone who has an unhealthy obsession with weapons and a grudge or no real interest in continuing their life is likely to put the two together in their imagination at some point. The probability of this fantasy being translated into action depends on the strength of these two drives, and their ease of access to weapons. The only factor in this that society has the means to control is access to weapons. You can't eliminate them completely since all the criminals aren't going to give them up. But you can make it much more difficult for lunatics to obtain them. To deny that would save lives is either disingenuous or plainly malicious.
I am thoroughly disgusted by the number of people who parrot ad hoc 'trick' arguments like 'it's not the gun that kills it's the man holding it'. This argument is designed to divert us from the truth, which is that for firearm killings, the combination of the man and the gun performs the killing.
It might be very difficult to understand why the majority of Americans are unable to see through these specious arguments. The most likely explanation is that the gun lobby is simply so powerful that most of American society has been indoctrinated into this mindset since childhood. I wouldn't call it a way of thinking because in fact it is a way of not thinking. Most people blindly repeat what they've been told again and again throughout their lives. When confronted with evidence that what they have been told is wrong they are simply unable to frame the obvious question as there's just no room for it in their brains. Well there's nothing new in this and it's not a problem confined to gun control issues.
America is being brainwashed by vested interests (the firearms industry), assisted by those they have already converted (gun nuts). Unfortunately the casualties are often innocent, often children, and almost always unarmed. Which puts a nice perspective on it, doesn't it? The official line is that Americans have the right to bear arms to defend themselves against aggressors but I wonder how often these weapons have been useful in this context compared to the number of times they have been used in aggression.
Some people have already suggested that if everyone carried a gun then that wouldn't be an issue. But many people don't want to carry a gun. Guns are dangerous; a large proportion of serious gunshot wounds are accidental. And of course if you do draw a gun there is a possibility that the other guy will draw his and he'll be quicker to fire. So this just won't work.
Sometimes I think if there were any real justice then everybody who promotes free access to firearms would be made to face a bullet from their own gun. He who lives by the sword...
In the UK where firearms are more tightly controlled we have a much lower incidence of murder than you do in America. Enough said.
Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
Thought exists only as an abstraction
hmm ... just to add to the flamebait, this expression is open to interpretation. The term "well-regulated" had an alternate meaning in reference to firearms in 1776 -- "in good working order". So, "a well-regulated" militia would mean that the populace should have guns, and they should be kept in good working condition.
Actually, would *you* like to see your parents go through your diary (assuming you keep one)? I definitely wouldn't. Yes, it is necessary for parents to keep in touch with their children's feelings. But that doesn't mean the parents may turn fascist on them.
Just to add a bit to this ...
I spent 6 years in our lovely nations capital. It is (was) illegal to own any type of firearm within the boundaries of the District of Columbia, but D.C has the highest-per-capita murder rate by shootings of *anywhere* in the world. At the time I was living there, on average a person was shot to death every 13 hours.
One of the funniest things regarding Gun Control in DC was when Carl Rowen (writer for the Washington Post, BIG proponent of gun control, resident of DC) shot a teenager with an unregistered handgun for tresspassing (the kid thought Rowen was out of town and was using Rowen's swimming pool).
When I first heard of the shooting in Colorado, I was initially shocked. I then realized that this will be another case where parents (the older generation) will point to this case and say, "See, I told you that kids are nothing more than punks." Each generation from the beginning of time has always viewed the upcoming generation with disdain and disappointment. When that generation grows up, they as a whole exceed what was expected out of the them from the previous generation.
Yet that generation does not learn from the errors of the previous generation. They go on to repeat the same offenses and treat their children the same as their parents treated them. This cycle of blame is a never ending cycle. It is human nature to distrust those who are not apart of our group. That is the reason why there exists racism, hate, and other such distasteful acts. Don't be surprised by the way in which our society is treating our generation. They were treated that way by their parents and we as a whole will treat our kids the same way.
Are you part of a well-regulated militia?
Why does Canada also have much lower murder rates? Compare the statistics between Seattle and Vancouver sometime.
pooptruck
You'll find out that murder rates have a lot more to do with economic and cultural issues than the availability of firearms.
Yes, I agress completely.
In the United States, the availability of handguns, and the entire militaristic culture, on top of a abysmal economic and cultural structure is akin to throwing gasoline onto a fire.
pooptruck
I would like to add that people kill a lot more *often* because of guns, but if they did not have guns they would use knives, and the really crazy ones would use their hands...
I think eliminating guns would stop the headlines like "27 people slain in Bank Robbery" but it would not stop murder altogether.
I agree with most of what your mother did..until I got to this point...
"My mother made a point of my knowing that I would not be allowed to date untill I was 16."
Having seen that she was a reasonable human being by your previous comments, I'm at a loss to see what made her use that out-dated and clichish rule.
It doesn't work, plain and simple. If a woman wants to have a relationship with a man, she will. And it will then be one with NO parental control whatsoever. It doesn't accomplish anything but lead to implicit disrespect of the parent who is attempting to control the RELATIONSHIPS of the son (or more likely) daughter.
Parents already have enough of a problem accepting the significant others of their children. They can't control who their sons or daughters see, they can only try to adjust the morals of the children to help them choose someone "reasonable".
Putting this rule in place along with a "don't see tom" rule is just asking for the teenagers to take their "us against the world" stance. A female girl is more likely to run off with tom if her parents forbid her to see him, when she would have realized that tom was trying to take advantage of her if the parents had just given her slight hints (and NOT said tom's name outright).
I've personally known too many people hurt by this idiotic rule, and so I bristle inside everytime I hear it.
"Lock your daughters up" didn't even work in the 50's, and it SURE the hell won't work today!
The reason why it's such a strong peee of mine is not because of it being "outdated", it's the truely horrible things that I've witnessed because of parents trying to enforce this rule. Some women delierately chose men that they wouldn't have dated otherwise, just to get back. Others had very committed relationships that they hid underground.
Lots of confrontations occurred. Some times, the woman never came home again.
"I didnt mind the rule at all. Most of the time i was thank full for it. It was an easy out when all the strang guys in Junior high started sniffing at my heels."
*sigh* why women don't just say "NO, I'M NOT INTERESTED IN YOU IN THAT WAY." and instead look for "easy outs" is something that will frustrate men for the rest of time...
But the reason why it worked well for you was that you didn't want to date at that time anyways.
Let me clarify something...were you just not allowed to date before you were 16 (as in going out on the town), or were you not allowed to have a "boyfriend" either? Most parents choose the latter interpretation of "no dating" rather then the former, the difference being that they aren't even allowed to promise exclusitivity to someone and they get "suspicious" when they start talking on the phone with someone for too long.
"I hope im not standing on soap boxes. The heights make me hard to understand."
I hope I'm not yelling from a soapbox either, i've just watched people suffer from having their parents try to influence their child's relationships, and then justify it because "They're only teens..they don't know any better."
And I recently had MY run in with my parents, where they tried to tell me at the age of 20, that I didn't know what I was doing relationship wise because I was in a relationship with one of lesser socioeconomic status then myself. After 2 years and getting to the point several times of almost never speaking to them again, I think they have FINALLY accepted her. But I still feel resentful that they felt like they had the right to interfere in my relationships, and I am much less likely to talk about anything having to do with this relationship in the future with them.
Truely you are blessed to have such parents. My parents, as cool as they are, had the tendency to assume that I understood what was expected of me. Sure I got talks about sex, drugs, and such but they were never difinitve. When I had to face it for the first time all alone I was really struggling for the "right" decision. Then I wished my parents had been more open and not just "we never did it so you shouldn't have any problem if you do just as we did."
I hope more parents can learn to talk with their kids and help them learn to make rational decisions based on logic and not pat answers.
Your are right that privacy for a kid is not absolute but IMHO it is still a right. Humans naturally like to have things that they call theirs. For me I know it was my room. I defended my right to be alone in my room constantly aginst my brothers. My parents would usually let me be alone in my room and not bother me unless they had some reason to belive that I was doing something I shouldn't have been. They never went through my stuff (at least no that I know of) when I wasn't there. I felt safe in keeping things there and leaving stuff I considered personal around my room. I doubt I would have felt safe if I knew that my parents would just randomly go through everything I owned. It wouldn't have prevented me form doing things I didn't want my parents and I probably would have trusted them less. So when I got in trouble they wouldn't have been on my list of people to ask for help.
I think that trust is a two way street. Many of my friends rejected their parents advice simply because they didn't trust them. I want my kids to trust me and know that I trust them. Should they ever break that trust there would be consquenses but the most important thing would be to get that trust back. I think that if parent's were to be more open with their kids and try to be less dogmatic with them their relationships would be much stronger.
There will always be times you have to make "executive judgements" but the less you have to do that the better. If you parenting is more lecturing than heart to heart conversation you are bound to have problems.
Perhaps you're in another country, but children's rights here in the States are quite limited. This is why they are required to attend school, can have a curfew imposed upon them by the local government, can't vote, etc.
I see nothing wrong with parents requesting a child to open his personal documents (or boxes, or whatever) in their presence. I don't see this as accusatory, but as precautious.
Personally, when I was a kid, I wouldn't have cared if my parents had gone through my things. Yes, I was involved in my share of things that I shouldn't have been- but I was willing to take the risk of getting caught because of my own belief system and how I felt about those things.
If a child is so afraid for a parent to find out about something, it tends to indicate one of two things to me. Either (1) the parent is truly abusive and the child shouldn't be in their care to start with, or (2) the kid is smart enough to know he shouldn't be doing it and too dumb to stop. I see nothing wrong with a parent stopping a child from doing something that stupid.
I have two friends a husband and a wife that stopped quarreling after they got two doom capable machines. Than, when they had something to "say" to each other, they simply sat down and shoot the f... out of each other for half an hour.
;-)
Usually killing things on screen is a good recreation and decreases the possibility that you will exercise violent behaviour in real life.
From my personal "perverted" point of view doom/quake/etc should are good therapy. You take a break, you kill a couple of monsters and/or your neigbour/wife/schoolmate in virtual reality and you discharge the violence. A very good example for the fertility of this approach are the japanese. They have dolls depicting their bosses to kick and punch in their lunch halls
My only question is:
Katz you started this theme, why the f... did not you reach the obvious conclusion - that violent games are GOOD. Why did you stop at the point that they are NOT BAD. Not enough guts may be?
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
They would've still done it. They wanted to die, and anyways, they knew police would be at the school soon enough.
These kids wanted to commit suicide and have as much fun & revenge as they could before dying. It's sick, but obviously their motives were clear. Kill and destroy as much as possible before killing themselves.
- sigs are for wimps.
I am amused at some of the media attention I have witnessed regarding this incident. One foolish journalist called it the "worst massacre in American history...". Now, I am a) not a historian, b) not a Native American, but if I were of Native American descent, I would have to take umbrage at that statement. There are horrible massacres occurring on a daily basis, around the world. The media's attention to specific events can cause public opinion/sympathy to flow in different directions, depending on the cricumstances surrounding the incident. For instance, look at the horrific mass murders perpetrated by the khmer rouge (sp?) in Cambodia. The media (for the most part) didn't seek to bring the problem to light, mostly due to America's feelings at the time about Southeast Asia. Contrast that with the attention paid to the Milosivec issue. Let's not even talk about what has happened in Africa with some of the warlords there. I am not trying to wave off the fact of the deaths in Colorado. Nor am I trying to blame the media for it happening. I am just saying that we should keep perspective and understand that just because the media highlights an issue, doesn't mean that there are not even more horrible things happening in other places. Not a very nice thing to think about, but the world we live in is not a very nice place.
Teenage males are prone to one stimuli more than all others combined. SEX. I'm willing to bet that sexual frustration leads more teens to psychotic breakdowns than Doom, the Net, AD&D could ever. The fact that these kids may have taken part in such activities may further remove them from their peers and oportunities to interact in a healty manner but this hardly is enough to turn an individual against society.
I really blame the marketing guru's who decide how to make sex sell today. The pressure exerted by advertisers coupled with a teenagers hormones coupled with uncertainty about what the future holds is certainly enough to overwhelm confused youths. These kids chose people who were getting laid and tried to kill them.
Why doesn't the media address the adverising issue? Oh yeah that's where they're money comes from. No small mystery there. AD&D and doom adverising dollars haven't ever sponsered the evening news and the internet threatens the well established medias control of today's stories
What made you choose this particular message to respond to?
Brad's statements also struck home for me. I also feel like I can relate to the young men who committed this horrendous act. There was a time in my life where I felt like the entire world was a sham and that I no longer wanted to play the sadistic games that the world was making me play. I often entertained similar fantasies of striking back against the people who I blamed for my internal agony. When I first heard detailed accounts of the events in Littleton my first thoughts were "How close did I come to that?" Thankfully, I had enough constructive interests, love for my family and a close-knit online community to rely on.
I doubt that many people see the other side of this story. It's hard to have sympathy for brutal killers who have done all they can to destroy their own community. But let's not forget that something drove them to this point. Some combination of pain and hopelessness stewed within them for years. What would it take to drive you to that point?
pipe bombs . . . killed the most people at the school.
This is very interesting. The same claim is made in the post adjacent to yours, the first response to the post to which you responded. I wonder if you're aware that your claim is false? I'm not sure that's a meaningful question to ask.
One way or another, the real issue here is the opportunity to watch in real time as the right wingers communally evolve a myth about the incident, a myth which twists and/or denies the facts just enough to support their dogma, but no more than necessary (after all, you don't want to be too obvious when you've got to hide your dishonesty from yourself as well as your neighbors). I don't recall seeing the "bombs did the killing" meme until today. I'm expecting to see it thrive, because it's very convenient, and it dovetails with some questionable statements made by some of the police about the power of the bombs that were found. There's obviously no logical connection between one and the other, but there's an emotional connection, which is what counts when you're building a myth. A couple of weeks from now, there will be a standard revisionist history of these events, which will still swing pretty close to reality at a number of points, but which will profoundly distort the meaning of what happened. To be fair, the mainstream media are also in the process of creating a palatable myth about it, without much greater concern for factual accuracy. Their myth is palatable to people with different preconceptions, that's all.
I've been watching the right wing in the U.S. (loosely defined as anything from Rush Limbaugh on out to Aryan Nation) on and off, and they seem to be engaged in a massive act of communal myth-generation, almost like the founding of a religion. It's not a consistent "story", of course. For example, they talk a lot about Hitler, but some of them try to wish the Holocaust away, while others brag about it, and still others use it as a conventional symbol of evil and accuse their "enemies" of "acting like Hitler". In other respects, they're very much on the same wavelength, for example about the environment, "free enterprise", the establishment of a state-imposed religion, and so on.
Of course this stuff has been going on forever. The red scares of the thirties and fifties were mining the same vein, and conspiracy theories are always popular on the fringe. These lies were old when William Jennings Bryan told them. Are we really seeing something new, or just the same old flowers of evil blooming anew in the hothouse of cheap bandwidth? (Whoa! Purple prose!
These things are caused by fear and uncertainty. Rigid, elaborate dogma appeals to people who need something to cling to. Why are they so afraid? My guess is that it's the economy. Voices on the left have been trying to warn us for a few years now that the "prosperity" we now have in the U.S. is largely illusory. Hey, I'm writing code, I'm fat and happy, right? Sure, and that applies to a lot of us, but the demand on food banks has been growing steadily for years, and while unemployment remains low, millions of well-paying, full-time manufacturing jobs have morphed into part-time, minimum-wage "service sector" jobs. We heard about the whole "rust belt" thing back in the 1980's, but has anything changed, or did the media just get bored with the story and move on? We're having a great time partying in here, inside the gates, but the peasants are out there with pitchforks and they are pissed. (By the way, check out Pat Buchanan's platform this year -- in addition to the standard-issue xenophobia and religious intolerance, he's got some very old-time-populist emphasis on jobs-for-the-working-man and so forth. He's talking about siding with labor against management. He sees it too.)
Hell, maybe it's millenarian anxiety. Who knows? Whatever it is, it's a trip to watch.
"Once a solution is found, a compatibility problem becomes indescribably boring because it has only... practical importance"
"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law." --
PEOPLE did all that . . . Not God.
Oh yeah? What about Sodom'n'Gomorrah, the plagues in Egypt, etc. etc. etc. God was a bloody-handed bastard in those days, before He got religion and settled down in the New Testament.
"Once a solution is found, a compatibility problem becomes indescribably boring because it has only... practical importance"
"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law." --
Or the problems in N. Ireland where it's the Protestants versus catholics?
The religion is incidental there. The problem is, essentially, that the locals are still resisting an invasion that happened 800 years ago, and which wasn't about religion at all -- in fact that was long before Luther. It's just a garden-variety war. It's no more about religion than was the resistance of largely Catholic Frenchmen against largely protestant Germans in WWII.
I don't mean to suggest that this invalidates your thesis, though.
"Once a solution is found, a compatibility problem becomes indescribably boring because it has only... practical importance"
"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law." --
I believe it was all first born sons. This particular scene in the movie "Prince of Egypt" gave my seven year old daughter the hee-bee-jeebies.
Yeah, I'll bet. I hope you gave 101 Dalmatians a clean miss. I'd never expose young kids to the Old Testament, any more than I'd expose them to Disney or William S. Burroughs. They can learn about senseless brutality when they're old enough to understand why it's wrong.
"Once a solution is found, a compatibility problem becomes indescribably boring because it has only... practical importance"
"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law." --
#1: When somebody disagrees with you, you immediately start howling personal insults. (Incidentally, behaving like a moron or a maniac makes it very hard for people not to write off your views as the views of a maniacal moron). I'm looking at your post, and you clearly lack the maturity, self-control, and intelligence to be trusted with anything more dangerous than a Q-tip. You are not furthering your cause.
#2: THIS HOME IS A GUN-FREE ZONE
I wish you joy of all the delightful visitors you will attract.
Blah, blah, blah. In the dark, in a strange house, a baseball bat or a golf club is a lot more dangerous than a gun. (Of course, on a sunny sunday afternoon when your twelve-year-old and his friend find a loaded gun in your drawer . . . that's a different matter, and you'd better hope the odds of a clean kill are poor.) Furthermore, how often do criminals invade people's houses? I once lived in a high-crime area for years and never heard of this happening. I'm sure it happens occasionally, but certainly a lot less often than some drunk idiot blows his brother-in-law's head off by accident.
"Once a solution is found, a compatibility problem becomes indescribably boring because it has only... practical importance"
"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law." --
"Uneducated people", eh? Heh. You're not talking about education. You're talking about sharing your world-view. That's a very different thing.
As for your "facts", that same boilerplate has been posted about ten times in this discussion alone. It's funny this one essay seems to be the only thing any of you people have to support your opinions. Oh, yeah, I forgot: You people also have an endless list of quotations from famous people, which is just plain ridiculous. I could compile an equally long list of mots justes supporting just about anything, from flat-earthism to Leninism. So what? Somebody famous said something in a memorable way. BFD. That proves nothing.
if you are stupid enough to keep your gun where it accessible to your kids, you shouldn't have had kids in the first place.
Heh. It doesn't matter. You won't have them for long.
By the way, the tiny part of your own post which was yours, rather than regurgitated pap, is almost as obnoxious and childish as the fool you're defending. You, also, have reinforced my impression of gun nuts as intellectually dishonest swine. In fact, I've met some who didn't fit the mold at all, but it's hard to hold them in mind when dealing with people like you.
I've met a lot of people who are intelligent and emotionally stable enough to be trusted with deadly weapons. You aren't one of them.
"Once a solution is found, a compatibility problem becomes indescribably boring because it has only... practical importance"
"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law." --
So what did your last 3 paragraphs have to do with the rest of your argument?
There was no "argument", there was idle speculation. The last three paragraphs elaborated on the idle speculation begun in the previous paragraphs. That seems simple enough.
The simple fact is, those two kids were obviously insane, and criminal.
Well, duh. Of course they were. I think most of us are in agreement on that. You could argue about the definition of "insane", but by any normal standards those kids had some badly defective wiring. I wasn't discussing that at all, though. I was talking about some people's reaction to their insanity and criminality. This culture appears to be under a lot of strain for some reason. People are freaking out in all kinds of ways. A lot of them seem to be worshipping imaginary benevolent aliens who perform elective surgery on them, which they find incredibly terrifying but which they nevertheless consider beneficial. Others are fixated on millenarian religions, and still others are convinced that the government is plotting to kill them for mysterious reasons. Many of those believe that the United States government is controlled by Israel (BTW many Israelis bitterly suspect that it's just the opposite). People are retreating wholesale into a lot of very dark and disturbing fantasies. Of course, maybe it's not as bad as I think. Maybe the above concerns are my "dark and disturbing fantasy". Fortunately, I'm not obsessed with it. Well . . . I don't think I am . . .
Back on the topic, a "dark and disturbing fantasy" is as good a term as any for what must have been going through these kids heads when they decided to murder their schoolmates.
nobody in their right minds just goes on a killing spree because they feel hated.
There isn't a simple, clear-cut distinction between "right mind" and "not right mind". We all have our little issues, some more than others, and some overwhelmingly. IMHO these kids were out towards the weird end of the scale, but it's not like they were an entirely different kind of animal from you and I. They just had in great abundance some qualities that you and I are fortunate to have in very small doses. As for feeling "hated", I can't understand any more than you how that would drive somebody to commit mass murder. But you don't know how "hated" they felt, and if they were only an inch from the edge to begin with . . . When I was in high school (if I may overwork the metaphor), I was several feet from the edge. A lot of taunting in the halls might have driven me an inch or two towards that edge, but I had so much room to spare that it was no problem. I could cope. These kids lacked that room. The people who taunted them had no way of knowing that, of course. (If they'd known, I doubt very much that they'd have behaved as they did.) The taunters were raised in a world where it's admirable to shit on geeks, and they followed the rules. They were good kids. Millions of good kids like them engage in socially approved sadism every year in schools where nobody gets killed. Fortunately, very, very few people are as unstable and amoral as those two killers. I don't care what kind of abuse those two kids had to put up with, their response was insanely out of proportion. Not only was it out of proportion, but I doubt that most of the people they hurt had anything to do with the abuse anyway.
do you really think that ALL the jocks in that school teased them? All the popular people? I seriously doubt it.
I never even alluded to that issue. As it happens, I share your doubts, but that's unrelated to anything that I can see in my post. Now, of course, I've discussed it above.
I'm beginning to think that you saw my post as an attempt to justify or excuse the killings in some way. If so, please allow me to apologize. That was not at all my intent. I was rambling about the politics swirling around the whole thing, not about the event itself. Now that I think about it, that's pretty depressing, isn't it? The ultimate significance of this thing for most Americans will be as a political football. Meanwhile, the families grieve. IMHO they deserve better than to be used so cynically. The killers laughed when they shot people, and we're all shocked by that, but the people rushing to make use of the event to sell an agenda aren't showing any clear signs of human decency either.
"Once a solution is found, a compatibility problem becomes indescribably boring because it has only... practical importance"
"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law." --
Right Wing "engaged in a massive act of communal myth-generation," I don't see that.
If that's the case, you're probably not watching very closely. Either that or you're too close to see the outlines.
I think that once a person gets elevated to national status in a party, they get swept up in the politicing and forget what they use to be about.
I'm not talking about those people. A lot of grass-roots right-wingers feel badly betrayed by "their" leadership in congress, and quite a few never trusted "moderates" like Buchanan and Gingrich to begin with. The people generating the myths are not elected officials. I am not talking about the mainstream. I am not talking about anybody who will ever turn up on network television (except for a few who get arrested, like Tim McVeigh -- but that's not the same kind of exposure as the McLaughlin Group) (oh, yeah, just for the record: IMHO Tim McVeigh deserves the same presumption of innocence as you and me and everybody else Ken Starr doesn't have a grudge against).
Stereotyping the whole group doesn't get us anywhere.
I'm looking at observed phenomena here. I'm not suggesting any profiles for state troopers to use in arresting "suspected right-wing kooks", or anything like that. I am discussing the fact that this consensual hallucination does in fact exist. The militias are out there. Have a look at their web sites. They exist, and they're not living on the same planet as the rest of us. Naturally, some are in the middle of it and some are at the edges. Some buy it all, and some buy only parts.
The same goes for the new-age flying-saucer lunatics. They're at least as crazy as the right wing, believe me. Fortunately they don't go in for weapons so much, so they seem less dangerous, but any wholesale rejection of reality is a cause for concern.
Yeah, there are a lot of kooks out there screaming out about nationalism, about how the races should be seperate or how there should be just one race, but those people are not what makes up a political faction.
Nobody's talking about political factions as such. I was talking about the people I describe above. By the way, though, that is precisely what makes up political factions, in some extreme cases.
I think your post has nothing of value in it.
Well, ain't that special. God forbid we should pay attention to the world around us, much less try to understand it.
"Once a solution is found, a compatibility problem becomes indescribably boring because it has only... practical importance"
"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law." --
Simple enough for you? Nope? Oh, well.
All you have to offer is mindless ideological name-calling. That is my point. That has been my point from the start. It is a very simple and clear thought which you are unable to comprehend, because you have the mentality of a rabid dog. I will now stop wasting my time reasoning with you. Instead, I will enjoy myself.
I've provide stats and studies from many sources.
All I've seen is one tired, shopworn propaganda leaflet that I've seen dozens of times before. It doesn't even seem to come with a bibliography.
Oh, God. Now I've done it. He's gonna come up with a bibliography. And in keeping with the insane formal requirements for the "right wing documentation" signifier, it's gonna be four thousand pages long and consist mostly of unpublished monographs by the same author and/or his wife -- along with seven impeccably credentialled Holocaust deniers, whereabouts presently unknown.
Dude, I am not gonna read this thing all the way through, okay? The medium is the message anyway, such as it is.
Please come up with a scientific study that shows more guns equals more crime.
Why? I don't really give a rat's ass one way or the other. You're the one obsessed with the issue, not me.
Your opinions such as "a baseball bat is better for defense then a gun",
Your compulsion to quote out of context is not as amusing as you probably think. In the dark, as I said, I'd rather have a baseball bat in my hand than a gun. Think about the geometry involved. Think about aiming. Do you know what "geometry" is? No? Want me to explain it? Sorry, no handouts. Figure it out for yourself.
"criminals don't break into houses too often, do they?"
Name more than half a dozen recorded instances in the last year in any major city. Compare that to mugging. It's damn rare, dude, face it. It's a bogeyman. You're trying to stir up irrational fears without offering any evidence. No, lists of large round numbers from the NRA do not count as evidence. Sorry. I can press the zero key, too, as many times as I like -- but that doesn't tell you about anything except the fact that I have fingers. As for you, I'll grant fingers, but on the opposable thumb issue the jury is just about in. Between the two of us, it doesn't look good.
"Once a solution is found, a compatibility problem becomes indescribably boring because it has only... practical importance"
"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law." --
Apparently you've never shot a handgun,
.
Of course I have. Not often, nor recently, but I have.
aiming is alot like pointing your finger.
Actually, handguns are a lot heavier. In fact, that's not the impression I recall at all. Never mind.
With a shotgun you just basically point in the general direction and fire
Have you ever set eyes on a firearm in your life?
Unless you're firing from the end of a nice long hallway, the pellets aren't going to spread that much before they go winging harmlessly past the intruder. Pointing in the "general direction" signifies optimism and faith, but very little common sense.
With spittle flying, eyes rolling, and much boldface, you howled the following unsupported claim: In the US, the rate is 13%. In Canada and the UK where gun control laws keep guns out of law abiding citizens hands, the rate is 50%
Hey, that may even be accurate. You don't have the necessary mental equipment to tell time properly, but maybe you guessed right on that one.
But you know what? It's fine by me. I just had a cool idea: Sure, there are thousands of borderline-schizophrenic maniacs out there like you, hiding under the bed, quivering in fear with your gun in your hand. Okay. I'm cool with that. For one thing, I live in the civilized part of the country (Cambridge, MA) so I don't have to look at you. That makes it easier. But the main point is this: If you really are scaring the elephants away, you're scaring them away from my house, too. So I can lead a normal, rational life while the elephants (if any) stay clear. I can read books while you listen to the civil defense radio, eat interesting food while you gnaw on MRE's, etc. And you're there under your bed muttering and gnashing your teeth because I'm not insane too. Well, hey, tough shit. We all make choices, and you've made yours.
I think that's really what's eating you here. You're pissed off because you suspect that I'm having a lot more fun than you are. Well, you're right. I am.
Wright and Rossi (1986, p. 151) interviewed felony prisoners in ten state correctional systems and found that 56 percent . .
. . . of convicted felons told them the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Are you really that naive? Who am I kidding, of course you are. Look at you.
Look, I'm sorry if I'm not taking you very seriously here, but it's just not possible. You're a clown. You're a cartoon. You're unintentionally hilarious.
And once again: I've met a lot of people who are mentally competent and emotionally stable enough to be trusted with firearms, but you are not one of them.
"Once a solution is found, a compatibility problem becomes indescribably boring because it has only... practical importance"
"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law." --
You can't because the whole anti-gun agenda is centered around ignoring the truth, and is in fact afraid of the truth.
The "anti-gun agenda"? That's a joke, right? You're insane, too. I hope you realize that.
As for the truth, what's your idea of the "truth"? ZOG? The black helicopters? You are enmeshed in an endlessly complicated and fundamentally hilarious delusional system.
Grow up.
"Once a solution is found, a compatibility problem becomes indescribably boring because it has only... practical importance"
"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law." --
Some conservatives claim that this whole thing happened because America isn't "Christian" enough
Hell, they blame everything on that. The blame the weather on not being "christian" enough.
Did you read the response to the second link you gave? It's brilliant. I am in awe. I was going to reply myself but there was nothing left to say.
Expect to see much more of this in the next several weeks. Eventually, it will be only Christians that they were targeting.
That wouldn't surprise me a bit.
Look on the bright side: The "Great Awakening" in the 19th century blew over after a few decades. The present silly season has been going on for a while already. It may just be hitting its stride, but you never know. Ten years from now this may all seem like a bad dream.
"Once a solution is found, a compatibility problem becomes indescribably boring because it has only... practical importance"
"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law." --
You spew laughable and easyly disproved opinions
Every time you "quote" me, the words bear less resemblance to what I actually wrote. Obviously, you think I'm right. If you thought I was wrong, you'd quote me accurately and refute what I said. Instead, you're refuting something else. There's only one reason why people do that.
In general, your hysterical and hyperaggressive manner is that of somebody who knows he is wrong. If you had any confidence in the truth of the dogma you love so much, you wouldn't go into hysterics when somebody disagrees with you. Do you know what a polygraph is? It's popularly known as a "lie detector". It doesn't magically "detect" lies or anything like that, though. What it does is measure a number of things like heart rate, perspiration, etc. It measures nervousness. The assumption is that if you're calm, you're telling the truth. This generally does turn out to be the case in practice. People who are telling the truth don't need to be afraid of anything.
Sound familiar?
You can't respond intelligently so you must resort of personal attacks.
See above. Bear in mind also that I started this sub-thread by observing that most gun advocates are incapable of discussing the issue without resorting to personal attacks themselves. They start off with personal attacks. You certainly did. You think that anybody who disagrees with you is evil and out to get you. Well, not only is that crazy, but it's a great way to convince people that you're not worth listening to. That, in fact, was the point of departure for this whole discussion. I started flaming you because you clearly were not capable of behaving rationally, and it was more fun to poke you with a stick than to waste my time trying to communicate.
Pry open your small closed mind, disregard your preconceived notions
This sounds odd coming from somebody who gets all of his thoughts and ideas from the NRA, and who flames anybody who disagrees with him. If you were capable of communicating other than by chanting received dogma at the top of your lungs, I might take this seriously.
Learn something about the objects you so viciously hate
Who but a lunatic would "viciously hate" an inanimate object? Does that make sense to you? If so, you need therapy now. I mean, sure, I may say that I "hate eggplant", but that's a figure of speech.
It's a fact that I have said absolutely nothing which in any way indicates that I "hate" guns, "viciously" or otherwise. In fact, I've mentioned more than once the fact that I've had some experience with them. So where are you getting this "vicious hate" thing? I'll tell you where. You're pulling it out of the sad little stock of preconceived notions which you use instead of the capacity for reason which the good Lord carelessly wasted on you. You're not talking to me at all, really. You're talking to yourself.
Think for yourself for a change.
See above. If you're not even capable of reading plain English when it conflicts with your expectations, how can you possibly believe that you "think"?
what a "choke" on a shotgun is, and the difference between "improved cylinder", "modified" and "extra full"
Are you talking about one of those "pump" things? I've never used one. If that's the case, you probably fish with bait. I don't have a whole lot to say to people like that.
Study the relationship between violence, crime, socio-economics, and gun ownership.
Crime is a separate issue, but the other three do show some very interesting correlations. There's no call to be rude so I'll leave it at that.
"Once a solution is found, a compatibility problem becomes indescribably boring because it has only... practical importance"
"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law." --
In Canada the pistol may not have been illegal in and of itself, but carrying it around in public (concealed or not) certainly is! Unlike the US, nobody seems to protest this law much.
Having now spent some time in the US, (I grew up and spent most of my adult life in Canada), the difference in gun laws seems now to me more a symptom than a cause. There appears to be a substantial minority of Americans who have an attitude about weapons that's quite rare in Canada: it's almost like they worship the guns and the right to own and do whatever they want with them, without having to commit to some responsibility for their use. They loudly and vocally protest the placing on guns the sort of `harsh' restrictions placed on things like automobiles. I really don't know why this is.
This sort of thing seems to be almost a general trend in the US: people yell a lot about freedom, but are willing to give up massive amounts of it in most areas. The US is far closer to a national ID system than Canada or England; the number of people who want (and get!) your SSN absolutely apalls me; there are all sorts of people and institutions requiring an SSN down here under circumstances where it would be illegal even to ask for it in Canada. And I don't see many signs of protest of it.
Anyway, a sensible gun control law to my mind might be to allow weapon ownership, concealment, and the like, but to force registeration of all weapons in the same way we force registeration of all cars and drivers. Then put in place some reasonable penalties for the owner if the weapon is ever used in committing a crime (regardless of whether the owner had anything to do with it or not). Add smaller penalties for selling a weapon to someone who then uses it to commit a crime. That should make gun owners and sellers take a bit of responsibility for the care and movement of their weapons, providing society with better protection against misuse.
cjs
The world's most portable OS: http://www.netbsd.org.
Last night, while flipping through the 100+ channels available to me on satellite, I came across the terrifiying visage of Jerry Falwell bemoaning the "death culture" of Amerian teenagers. As he nattered on about the evil of videogames, the screen shifted to a video of Quake2.
The caption identified it as "Quest II".
Let's remind these people to check their facts.
If you're so smart, why aren't you naked?
I rant about media issues from time to time. I have a friend who is a news reporter, and he usually has to put up with my wild speculations about the real causes of mysterious current events. I've had to say to him over and over again, "It's not a conspiracy. For it to be a conspiracy, it would all have to be done in secret."
I'm reminded of this now because my take on this latest school-shooting tragedy, is that There Is No Mystery Here. The reasons this event sequence is becoming so familiar to us are right before us, yet recognizing them for what they are would move a seemingly impossible problem to the very front of our minds. American culture is in a collective state of denial about what is so obviously wrong.
The popular wisdom about how to prevent these sorts of tragedies is utter hogwash. The heavy proliferation of small firearms and other weapon systems among the population is not the cause-- it's a symptom. Likewise, the popularity of violent imagery and scenarios in films, books, music, games and other media is not the cause-- it's a symptom. So many of us are stretching to explain away the increasing frequency of these heinous shooting events with illogical theories that don't bear up under analysis because we are in denial of the truth.
The truth is that the structure of American life, particularly in the middle-class, predominantly white, suburbs is corrupt, and this corruption is most keenly felt by young people, who lack the empowerment to do anything about it.
Every facet of life in the American suburbs is constructed for the convenience of middle-class working adults. The transportation infrastructure is devoted entirely to commuters in private automobiles. Land use is completely controlled by community planners whose vision of comfortable living is square mile after square mile of nothing but great big houses on tiny little plots.
The necessities of life, i.e. food, clothing, sundries are provided by megalithic, publicly-traded distribution companies-- you could land an airplane in their parking lots. All manner of retail services are automated to the point were business can be conducted with even once interacting with another human being.
Outside of their experiences at school, children in this environment get practically no opportunity to socialize and learn civil conduct. And the schools are massive structures, that serve thousands of children in a single location, and do so in a manner more suited toward training another generation of factory line assembly workers than to the teaching of arts, science, literacy, culture and history.
Need I remind us again about the extent to which American culture values the notion of public investment in an education infrastructure next to how much it thinks it should spend on the projection of military power around the world?
No there is no mystery here, unless it is this one: why is it so difficult for us, as a people, to recognize what is wrong and take steps to redesign the structure of life in America?
jhw
Actually..Denver area news outlets and sheriff department spokesmen have been quoted as saying all of the fatalities were the results of gunshot wounds. There was at least one of the wounded who received bomb shrapnel...but as of the last report no fatalities due to bombs...only guns.
Still want to stick to that line?
It may be worth trying to figure out how many of these 600,000 - 2,000,000 crimes NEVER would have happened in the first place if the US would enact gun-control laws with teeth. No one is naive enough to think that ALL crime would miracuously disappear with more gun-control but I'm willing to start somewhere.
We all know that kids can be really cruel sometimes. I suspect that it is, unfortunately, human nature.
It seems that, in order to set up a 'pecking order' or a social hierarchy of sorts, children resort to both physical and emotional bullying of their peers. It's a Darwinian thing of sorts, in the context of social interaction in the playground.
Our job is to teach them out of it. But, when we deal with similar situations in our daily adult lives, acceptance is a hard virtue to instill. Our children learn from our words, but mostly they learn from our actions.
When they hear us talk of acceptance, but see us keeping up with the Joneses, they come to believe that we are hipocrites and that status and conformity are what they should strive for.
When they hear us talk about generosity, and are later forbidden to play with the 'welfare case kid', they realize that generosity is a lie we tell ourselves to feel good about our station in life.
When they hear us talk about kindness, and then see their own grandparents left to die in nursing homes, and as they watch us explain how we have no time to visit them, they learn that kindness is something we extend to people who can contribute to our standard of living and our conveniences, and how those that are no longer 'of use' can simply be discarded.
I wish I had a solution to present, but there is this at least: The realization of human nature, and our own dis-illusionment with our shortcomings, will serve to make us better parents and better people. We must craft the next generation to take the effort further when it is their time. We can't do that by lying to ourselves, denying ourselves our own faults, being happy about how good we have it, compared to [fill in the blank] and how it's all [fill in the blank]'s fault.
-- What you do today will cost you a day of your life.
Katz claims that the instance count of violent crime perpetrated by teens is in decline. This may well be the case - though the stats he provides are inadequate to make the point stick.
What is significant, and contrary to Katz, is that the grandiosity of the crimes is on the upswing, as is the relative count of incidents of that scope. The number of kids going on a shooting rampage is at an all time high - even if gang warfare is in a recession.
The white-male-middle class is the fulcrum of society, we get no breaks, no quota, no glass ceiling to blame for our shortcomings. We are not discriminated against in ways the media is willing to make known. We are expected to be the hard working providers, to suck it up and deliver on the expectation of having had all the advantages while growing up.
This is where the problem lies. We are underprivileged and discriminated against as much as the next demographic, but we are branded as sissies if we voice that claim.
How many intelligent, non-sporting, geeks out there have had the proverbial sand kicked in their face? How many have gone on to become Charles Atlas? How many have gone on to become Charles Manson?
What the media is missing is not that these kids had a screw loose - it takes that to go berzerk. It isn't that they were desensitized to violence, I'll admit that I am... How many of you are dismayed that there is no UNDO button in your life? I am.
It is not NOT the fault of the parents, but a teen CAN hide things from a parent - even a pipe bomb and a gun. It's easy. If you can hide pot, you can hide ammo. This is not the issue. It isn't even the issue that parents are too busy to care - for the most part they're not, and it's more than a full time job to be completely aware.
Your kid needs some space from you - else you raise someone incapable of living their own life. Parental involvement, or lack thereof is not the issue either.
What is at issue is pure animal reactionism. Colorado was a suicide mission. So was the Kip incident. They just took their sources of pain with them when they died.
Consider: If you chain up a dog in your back yard, and beat it, and kick it, and underfeed it, and leave it in bad weather, and yell and alienate and hurt - will you dare wonder why it bites?
These kids were beaten and humiliated for at least their four years of highschool. They were abused by jocks, embarassed by the popular girls and looked down upon by the teachers that were there to help them into the 'real world'. Why was it a gym teacher that was killed? This was the only class they were failing, probably. It takes little thought to run laps, and you have to use the same locker room as the jocks that constantly give you wedgies. If you go to the teacher, you're labeled a panzie.
They grew up feeling like a minority, but seeing another minority get breaks and special treatment. There isn't a White History month, is there? There isn't a Geeky, Smart Male support group.
These kids saw the world as inherently unfair, hurtful and not worth living in. Their suicide was not an escape from responsibility or a resignation from the challenge of living - it was a singular assertion of control over their own destiny. They could not change the way the world treated them, so they took away the world's means to hurt them - they took their lives.
And, in the process of asserting their control over their lives, they chose to stick it to the world, just once. They got back at the people that had hurt them in a way that will forever be remembered. All the people that ignored them, saw through them and dismissed them as white thrash will remember them forever.
It's little wonder, from this perspective, to blame these kids for turing to neo-Nazism, racism and seclusion. These were the only niches of our demented culture that actually offered these misfits a sense of belonging to a community.
There's a whole treatise to be written on how a community of hate alters it's members mindset to serve it's own goals, but the point here is this: These kids were driven out of society proper by their inability to fit in. They were at the bottom of the pecking order, and they chose to separate themselves. They chose to associate themselves with a hateful mindset, and who can blame them? The mindset pushed their already well greased resentment buttons, and as life became more hopeless, they chose to go out in a blaze of glory - in their miswired frame of mind at least.
These kids were the children of our society, we let them down and they bit the hand that should have fed and nurtured them - but failed to do so.
-- What you do today will cost you a day of your life.
Though I'm fully aware the Supreme Court's current interpretation of the 2nd Amendment gives this duty to state militias, anyone who has studied history knows that this amendment exists because this country was founded out of rebellion againts a tyranical government. The current interpretation is just convenient politics. This is why we need guns.
It is unfortunate that these shootings occur, but banning the tools does not fix the tool user. How many festering crackpots will choose to go postal with another tool if we choose your SIMPLE solution? Guns do not cause shootings--people do.
Slashdot: Liberal News for Nerds. Liberal Stuff that Matters.
It's also not funny how the U.S. government can rain down bombs on villages in Yugoslavia and then pontificate on the tragedy of 20 dead highschoolers. Both incidents are tragic, but how can we complain when death and destruction are raining down on innocent people by our own government even as a type?
The world has so many problems. There's only one solution, and it's for people to follow Christ--sadly, most people can't even do that (esp. those who claim to be `Christians'). Thank God life is short--only 75 or more years (OTOH, much of it will be spent hacking, which makes up for the bad parts).
--jon. Postel is dead. May we all mourn his, and our, loss.
Actually,it has been shown that the availability of guns increases deaths....simple because even good people get mad, which is harmless unless there happens to be a gun sitting nearby. I saw a fairly reputable study showing that in the US most gun death were accidential or unintentially between family members. The presence of guns does not deter crime, it just makes it easier and more violent for it when it does happen.
Your examples citing gun laws are shortsighted. Crime everywhere in the us has dropped, including areas with sane gun laws. How come there is gun deaths so commen in intercitie areas where guns are also common. How come the armed guard in Colorado didn't stop the killings...Stating that guns prevent crime really misunderstands the nature of most gun deaths, dramitic example like this aside.
The commonly cited US constitution is in place to supposadly prevent the government from having too much power over the people. Back in the 1780s, when farmers with rifles and soldgers with rifles were on much closer standing, this made since. To continue that logic to today we should all own anti-tank weapons and SAMs, simply put there is no way for a civilian to be even near on par with a government troop in the era of modern warfare, how effective have the armed militia groups been when they get in to conflicts with the government, regardless of your opinion of them, I can't think of a single government agent being killed...hence the original intention of the constitution, while well founded at the time, is simply not relavent today.
I know of few that are arguing that the right to bear arms should be repealed....I know many who think that it should be more regulated. It is currently easier to get a gun than it is a drivers license....gee, that makes sense
ARRRRGGGGGGGGGG
Brian
Actually, I think a couple were....my bad. The point is that most of the armed resistance against the governement is extremely ineffective...civilians with civilian weapontry cannot come close to competing with trained, professional millitary and special police with advanced tech.
1 - Parents do not know what there kids are doing these days. They have the kids and expect society to raise them. Then when something goes wrong they blame tv, the movies, the internet etc. instead of accepting the fact that they do not know who there kids are or what they are doing.
2 - Why are parents not stopping there kids from useing the internet unsupervised? If they cannot supervie the kids, put computer in an open room, like the kitchen or the tv room, or somewhere where in the house where the parents are to monitor there childrens use to some extent?
3 - Why do I see 4 and 5 year old children WITH THERE PARENTS at R rated movies or movies that are rated pg - 13? Because the parents don't give a s***! Some of these people haveing children out there should not be having sex let alone breeding.
4 - Why get HBO and cable tv and expect them to monitor what your kids are able to watch? What are they that stupid? I PAY for HBO, I know it shows graphic R movies and late night porn. If you have kids, and don't want them to watch that stuff, put the cable box in the parents room, and put a lock on the parents bedroom door.
5 - The fact is that children should be raise by there parents NOT the Television, NOT the movie theaters, not the internet, BUT PARENTS!
6 - Schools cannot be blamed for all the problems that children have. Children only spend 1/3 of there days at school, and teachers have 30 children to watch, where as parent have what.. 2?
I am tired of hearing how society is responsible for everything. I hate the idea of censorship of television, and especially the internet.
The internet is not the problem!, the problems is that parent have lost touch with there children. These parents did not even know that there children were part of the trenchcoat mafia. That shows how out of touch they are with there children.
Only 'flamers' flame!
I lived for a year in Japan, and one of the saddest thing I saw was the semi-tolerated tradition of kids picking out one kid to torment because they acted different or looked different.
You had to go to Japan to see this behavior? It happens in America all the time.
i hope you don't have kids- a police state is no way to govern.
Synergies are basically awesome, and they're even better when you leverage them. -PA
Despite the fact that VA has what you feel to be "lax" gun laws, there are lots of things in place to make it easy for the police to catch these gun-runners. As you may or not be aware, guns are required to have a serial number. A number which is actually quite difficult to remove despite what you hear in movies. If the police recover a gun, they can contact the manufacturer who has a record of exactly who that gun was shipped to, and so on. It is my understanding that this system is automated to the point where the police can find out the retail point of sale where the gun was finally sold in under 72 hours. That store is required to keep forms that detail exactly who they sold the gun to.
As a result of these records, the police should be able to just go pick up these supposed gun-runners within days of finding an illegal gun in NYC or DC. Why they don't is a mystery to me. Either the criminals are using more sophisticated means to get their guns then you are claiming, or the BATF just doesn't have much interest in reducing the amount of gun-running going on. Actually, it's probably a bit of both. The criminals are probably obtaining fraudulent ID's, which is a problem the state DMV's need to address. The BATF probably doesn't want to deal with the reduction in their budget that would follow any real decrease in gun-running.
Either way, enforcing the laws we have now makes a lot more sense then just passing more laws that the police and criminals will ignore.
In theory, Congress passed a law banning "assault-weapons". In fact, it banned a bunch of guns based on their cosmetic appearance. In no way did it take into account the ability of a gun to kill people or do damage. The term "assault weapong" is a meaningless phrase used to associate semi-automatic rifles (which no army in the world uses, AFAIK) with military fully automatic rifles (which every army uses, AFAIK, and are heavily regulated, although they are not illegal. A fact that shocks many people who are ill informed about gun laws.). It's basically a propaganda term. Emotionally charged, but totally devoid of any actual meaning.
.223 Reminginton bullet. The Ruger Mini-14 was exempted by name, yet it is also a semi-automatic rifle which shoots the .223 Remington. High capacity magazines are available for both.
In fact, the law passed by Congress banned certain rifles by name, while specifically exempting others by name. The kicker is that it was easy to find pairs of guns which were functionally the same, yet one was banned and one was exempt. Case in point, the Colt AR-15 is banned by name. It is the semi-automatic equialent of the US Army's M-16. The AR-15 is a semi-automatic rifle, which shoots the
Another example is the AK-47. The semi-automatic variations were banned by name. Yet, the Ruger Mini-30 shoots exactly the same bullet, is semi-automatic, and is exempt by name. Go figure.
Now, that particular law also banned the manufacture and import of high capacity magazines (defined as being able to hold more than ten rounds.) In theory, this should have some effect on crime, but since all pre-ban magazines were grandfathered, and hence perfectly legal, they are still readily available. One interesting result of that law is a new generation of tiny, easy to conceal handguns. Since manufacturers are required to limit the capacity of the magazines to ten rounds, they figured why bother to make the gun any larger than it needs to be to hold ten rounds.
It's my experience that most people crying out for gun control really want to ban all guns. Take for example those who claim they only want to ban "assault weapons". What they really mean is that they want to ban all semi-automatic guns, leaving only bolt-action rifles. But, then they will begin calling bolt-action rifles "sniper" rifles, so that they can ban those too. What's left is black-power muskets, but of course you have to ban the black powder because you can use that build pipe bombs.
The "Mariano DiVittorio" named in the article cleary acted as a straw man purchaser, which is a federal offense. As indicated by the article, he could be easily identified by the 4473, and he commited a crime by purchasing that gun for Escobedo. But, notice how the article makes no mention of DiVittorio ever being arrested, charged, or convicted of the crime he commited. Moreover, the Stephen Young in the article is suing the manufacturer of the gun rather than the man who introduced the gun into the black market.
The obvious conclusion that I reach from this article is that we need to crack down on straw man purchases. It is really easy to catch the straw man purchasers, so I'm not sure why no one bothers. It's also really easy to catch the stores who sell to them (also a crime.) The BATF used to run stings to catch the stores that were known to sell to straw men, but it's been years since I've heard of them doing this. I'm sure that there are a handful of lax gun sellers around the country, but the records exist to make them easy to identify. I find it mind boggling that people call for more gun control when the police aren't using the tools they have now. I find it even more disturbing that people are suing the manufacturers instead of going after the lax gun sellers. As an analagy, suppose you live on a road where lots of people speed excessively. Well, speeding is illegal and it's pretty easy to catch speeders. The logical thing to do is put pressure on the police to enforce the law. Instead, people are suing car makers and asking Congress to ban speeding if children are in the car.
Since the shootings I've been hearing plans for new school security that sound like something out of a prison. Armed guards, metal detectors, surveillance cameras, secured exits, etc. Maybe they should add radar to the list.
Why do people have such are hard time putting things in perspective?
I've seen statistics like that before, but only from highly biased sources.
I would guess that the number of students that have ever been shot in school is still in the double digits, while kids that have ever been killed by an airplane falling on them is probably triple digits.
That's just a guess, but notice he didn't say "have an airplane fall out of the sky and kill them in school"
However, I would also guess that the rate of children being shot in school is increasing while planes falling is probably not.
Lets put it this way: If I were an insurance company, I would invent a new policy that paid out only in the event of a child getting shot in school. I could sell it for pennies and still get rich.
1. Maybe this will inspire hazard pay for teachers. They deserve to make a lot more.
2. If Doom can inspire boys to kill, maybe this puts Doom in the ranks of the classic works of poetry, books, and women which have inspired grown men to kill for most of recorded history.
3. Maybe the school killings will inspire a law which grants children all the rights of adults in this society, in addition to the responsibilities of adults, namely that if you get caught carrying a gun, you might sort of get shot by a police officer if he feels like you're better off dead.
4. Maybe this will make violence in games a bit more "tabboo" again, so that we can use it more artfully and dramatically in computer games. (I'm sorry, but some of the games that came out after Doom, were such pathetic, over-the-top wanna-be's.)
5. Maybe this will justify funding for more/better police officers to gaurd schools. Makes parents sad to see that happening, but I think it would be a good thing. I got beat up a lot as a kid, and I'll bet that wouldn't have happened with cops around.
6. Maybe I can add to my resume, "Like there are these connections, dude, between those games I worked on and like bad stuff. I'm not saying exactly, but hehe. Just trust me, dude. Connections. I swear! It was in the news and everything! I'm cool!"
John and Paul made me do it! Some creepy trivia for the ever-thirsty media. While programming Doom and Quake, I loved listening to Nine Inch Nails, Machines of Loving Grace, and even a little KMFDM. Of course, I also listened to a lot of Suzanne Vega, Sarah McLaughlin, and my all-time favorite, the Beatles.
You insensitive bitch! One day, American and I were brainstorming cool weapon ideas for Quake, and I contributed what would later be called the "nail gun" but which I had always thought of as the "spike gun" because I first dreamed of it when I was in junior high school. I was being bullied by kids because I looked and talked like a dork, and I was into D&D and computers. I literally wished I could shoot them with a spike that would nail them to a wall, where they would squint in pain, cry, and bleed a lot.
I only say this because I explicitly signed over my part of the Doom copyrights to id Software so that it could be sold in Canada, which means I can't be sued for being honest. Woohoo! Course, I ought to get my ears boxed by my parents for what I'm about to say..
I was a good kid in school, and the only temptations to violence I've had in my life were hateful thoughts I had about bullies. Bullies would suck at any age, but when you're young, they suck very large eggs. In fact, if bullying were an arrestable offense, I'd have been a much happier kid.
I liked the post from the guy who mentioned how weapons and explosives have always been available He's right. We should look at what changed, because it certainly isn't the availability of explosives and guns.
My pet theory is that the grand unified constant over time is that American kids want to be the coolest, the best, and different in a really awe-inspiring way. They so much want to be the coolest, that they're perfectly willing to be "bad guys" to achieve this.
Problem is, the "bad guys" used to just throw insults and punches, but then they graduated to sticks, then knifes, then guns and explosives. You have to keep one-upping the competition if you really want to be cooler. Now, knives are literally "kid stuff," and now it's probably not about packing a gun, it's probably about packing a gun that has "bad mutha fucka" scrawled on it in your enemy's blood. Remember when "bad" became a synonym for "cool"? Hey, it's just the next logical step.
I think if anything, the only thing we can expect is for the guns and explosives to get more exotic and powerful.
But I dunno for sure. Kids are incredibly smart, creative, and energetic. They might get cleverer, maybe dabbling in insinuitive poisons, elaborate booby traps, perhaps even murder with poetic slants. Hm. I'll bet if this happened, we might finally see girls as perpetrators of some of these nightmarish mass murders. They're definitely a lot crueler on a more regular basis than boys are, and clever! Jeez, I mean later on when they've grown up, some of them can cut you in half with a word. Snip!
It'd be pretty funky if a boy poisoned some crack cocaine so that a drug addict enemy of his died. Ooh! Or if he passively sold poisoned crack! Like setting out a rat trap. Man, you could do it cheaply and effectively by learning how to grow salmonella (it's gotta be easy if virtually all raw chicken has it) and infecting your drug with it. All the kids would get super sick, squirting out their insides for weeks and vomitting like there's no tomorrow. You know it would work, too, because the crack would probably lower their immune system to ensure infection. Wow. Hm. I couldn't enjoy that cause I've never had it in fer druggies, but it would be cool if all the bullies were crack heads. What do bullies have in common? Ponder, ponder...
I'll bet crack-poisoning would scare parents at first, but that after a while, they'd enjoy the fear that instilled in their kids. Kids don't believe completely random bad shit will just happen to them, but they definitely believe that assholes are out to get them, cause like, they are.
I think there's hope, though. America finds that sex is far more tabboo than violence. Maybe the next logical step in being cooler is starting to flash people in school, or filming their teachers getting it on and broadcasting it on the net, or um maybe "accidentally" bringing a porn VHS to school for their show n tell instead of the home movie.
Tell you what, that would have been AWESOME. Seeing a little T&A on the screen versus worrying about getting beat up? Dude, I'll take the skin. Sign me up. Thank you very much. Sex edukashun - by thuh students, four thuh students!
Oh boy, got a little excited and cracked a nasty rat. Oh my lord! Seek cover! What crawled up there?! Lemme borrow your pen for a second... oh.. oh god, oh man.. sorry about the pen.
Heh. Well, this has been a fun, nostalgic romp down memory lane. Kids, turning 30 sucks. Don't turn 30. I got hemorroids for my birthday. My business failed right before my birthday. And my marriage fell over right after my birthday. 30's bad, mmmkay? Actually, that's not true. I got the 'roids when I was 29. I think the key there is to not push like you're giving birth to a brown water balloon, and instead just kinda let it happen, ease 'em on out, just do some reading or contribute something to the stall door. Your anus will thank you later.
Just skip 30 and go straight to 31. I'll bet that one is a lot cooler. You're over the shock of 30, and it's like definitely your first year of being a "grown up." I think for my 31st birthday, I'm gonna go find some impressionable kid and give him some advice. "Hey kid, yeah you with the trench coat. Come here. That's it, atta boy, little closer... Yeah, OK, Perfect! LISTEN YOU LITTLE MORON, YOUR MOMMA TOLD YOU NOT TO APPROACH STRANGERS, NOW GET THE HELL AWAY FROM ME! RUN! I MIGHT BE A PSYCHO WITH SOME CANDY! RUN BOY RUN! There's a good boy. He'll grow up, god willing, to be a decent citizen like me someday."
OK, last tidbit, as I guess I'm sposed to be morbid and talk about the shootings a little. So, my vote for most nightmarish imagery is the kids trying to hide under their desks, and the shooters actually going out of their way to kill them, too. Oh my god. That gives me the giga-creeps. I swear I've had nightmares like that where I'm hiding from someone with a gun, and he keeps pointing it around whatever obstacle I'm using. Sweet Jesus.
Woah, I just realized something totally unfair. I'll bet if you look like Bill Gates as a kid, you get treated like royalty now. Hm...
Ah, the weekend. More time to extend my perfect record of never killing anyone another two days, and time to play my favorite computer game, Total Annihilation.
My parents drove me nuts around that age always worrying about where I, what I was doing, etc. And
even now as an adult, I don't see the necessity. All it did was widen the rift between us - and feed anger towards them.
I completely agree with you. Of course, I have no relationship with my parents anymore. Haven't spoken to them in over two years, but that's for many reasons that I won't delve(sp) into.
I appriciated my parents being worried when I did speak to them and when I was younger. But after I went to college and came home after freshman year, it did nothing but piss me off.
It made me feel like my parents didn't think I was responsible enough to take care of myself and do the "right" thing. While at the same time, all I ever heard from them was how responsible I was.
I always loved when I'd go out during the week and I had to work the next day and I got the "what time are you going to be home?" question....like I didn't know to be home at a resonable hour b/c I had to work the next day.
I'm a bitter person when it comes to parenting, b/c of what my parents did and the problems I had. Along with when I see kids whose parents give them everything and don't make them work for things.
In the end, some ppl just shouldn't reproduce and should fall of the earth before they have the chance too.
-Jae
I've seen several postings now along the lines of "Canada has never had a school (mass) shooting". Not true. A few years ago a young man went rampant in a girls' polytechnical school in Montreal and killed 22. Unless we're saying post-secondary institutions aren't 'schools', Canada by no means has a clean record. Albeit a much smaller one.
England...England.. ah yes,... the country where
two charming little boys kidnapped and killed another little kid, right? Too bad they weren't
smart enough to notice the surveillance camera
taping them.
When people want to kill, they're going to do it. People are out there who are sick. Lack of weaponry isn't going to change that. Laws regarding that weaponry won't change it.
Funny, I bet the British said the same thing in the 18th century... right before a band of poorly equipped rebels kicked their collective arses back where they came from.
Exactly.... as Heinlein says... an armed society is a POLITE society. If these kids (the survivors and victims alike) had maybe stopped to consider the way they were treating their fellow human beings, the tragedy might have been completely avoided.
We all tend to forget how tenuous our own lives are. We place them in everyone else's hands every day. You go to work at an office - are there letter openers at your office? Did you just really piss off the guy in the cube next to you through your rudeness, hurting his feelings, etc. Your life now depends on his ability to NOT pick up his letter opener and jam it into your thorax like he envisioned briefly.
Sadly, I would say the blame is equally divided between the two kids with guns and the hundreds of others who relentlessly tormented them.
bzzt!
Population size doesnt effect violence.
America is fucked. Thats a fact, look at Japan, much much more population DENSITY, and almost no gun violence.
"Computers will never truly be free until the last windows user is strangled with the entrails of the last mac user."
Thats bullshit, that arguement is true...
with a grain of salt or two.
America society likes violence, its the major world super power, its leadership is evil, and its violent and abuses its power toward other countries. Why expect anything differetn from its people?
"Computers will never truly be free until the last windows user is strangled with the entrails of the last mac user."
I am a senior at Arapahoe High School, in Littleton just 5 miles east of Columbine. They aren't our main rival (in sports, I mean), but I've watched two back-to-back state championship soccer games from the Arapahoe side of the field when it was down to us and the Columbine Rebels. As a result, there's been some animosity between our two schools. Needless to say, that was forgotten in about 5 seconds as many of us went down there to offer help and support.
/. and user friendly for a bit of escape, and then seeing Iliad's message there and then later that first huge thread on Slashdot.
Also, I am a varsity wrestler (hence the handle I use) and I just recently competed in the regional championships which were held in the Columbine gym.
And as soon as I heard about the shootings, the first thing that came to mind was the time I was sitting in a bathroom stall in the Columbine boy's bathroom during the tournament. All 3 walls were covered with hate messages, swastikas, references to satan, and especially things to the effect of "All jocks must die!" And, like all those Columbine students, I thought that was kind of strange and then promptly dismissed it as I left.
I don't personally know any of the victims, but it's been a hard last couple of days when I didn't know that fact. The coordinator of the gifted/talented program at Arapahoe (a good friend of mine) is the next door neighbor of a fatally wounded victim and has also known Dylan, one of the killers, since preschool. A fellow member of my track team is a friend of that kid everyone saw hanging out the window on the news. So its been a rough week, and I don't think it's quite hit me yet.
When I first found out about the incident, it had only just started 20 minutes earlier, and for the next several hours I was under the impression that it was a minor shooting, with perhaps a few injuries. Then, I got home after practice and got the updated story, and couldn't believe it.
You've all probably seen on the news what they've been saying about Littleton, CO. Well its true. Practically every school here is a blue ribbon school, no gang activity, long honor roll lists with the bumper stickers to prove it, and plenty of star athletes and achievers in every category. Oh, and despite the name, its not little - that (Little) is just the name of the original settler in the area. It's a suburb of Denver, and nothing separates the two except a thin invisible line.
So I believe them when they say "If it can happen in Littleton, it can happen anywhere." -cross community upbringing off the list. The thing about these communities that people consider "perfect" is that if you don't fit in, it can be an absolute hell. People that don't subscribe to the mainstream and fit the community's image probably feel like second class citizens.
The more you read about the kids' parents, the more you will realize they were not "brought up wrong" or "mistreated". No, they both come from 2 parent households, and the neighbors feel strongly enough that the parents were good caring people (Dylan's mom works as a counselor for disabled people) that they wrote a note, signed by 19(?) of them expressing their support for the parents (although I admit that them not knowing about all that bomb building has me stumped) so I don't thing it is parental upbringing. These two guys did little league sports and cub scouts, and the like, and Dylan attended a youth group with a friend of mine only last year. By his account, Dylan was normal.
Oh, and this "trenchcoat mafia" thing has also been blown out of proportion. This group (which was not a gang at all, and had no affiliates outside the school) was a geek type group that dressed different but had fun in their own way, and didn't harbour much more resentment than your average high schooler. They did, however, have a facination with guns. This is a description of that group as it stood last year, and they even took out a yearbook ad that shows the group of geeks all smiles.
Things turned sour with the group late last year, from what I heard, when the jocks started picking on them. Then the hate got turned up. They resented how the jocks seemed to run the school, and they were always picked on. A fight was arranged at a local baseball field after a big confrontation at the school. Trenchcoats showed up with brass knuckles and swords, so the jocks left.
I don't know for sure, but I believe that Eric and Dylan were drawn into the group through their interest in computers and weapons, and turned sour with the rest of the group from the run-ins with jocks. Their real flaw, I believe, was a combination of not knowing how to play the high school game and no effective method of dealing with hate. They channeled it into a long range plan, set in motion near the begining of this school year, to get revenge on the jocks and have the final say, so to speak.
Also, I think a factor was peer pressure. Eric was the leader, and Dylan was a follower, and let Eric suck him right into it - absolutely no personal sense of direction. And then it worked both ways. If you have a plan like this yourself, it's easy to back out, but if it's you and some friends, nobody wants to be the chicken.
In every way, they thought of the whole matter as a war. They developed a fascination for war (WWII in particular) and Hitler, and went around annoying people by marching around the school with precise 90 degree turns like soldiers.
Here is where the part about DOOM comes in. They were so consumed by their big plan, that they played DOOM head to head over their modems for hours upon hours. This was not for fun or relaxation or to try to beat each other or any of the normal reasons a person would play DOOM. They took it seriously and considered it training. They also played paintball a lot, and for the same reason. The important thing to stress here is, that while those 1st person shooters may or may not contribute to this kind of thing, in this case the plan came first and the "training" second.
All of this is kind of overwhelming when you are so close to it. Its kind of funny that, even after I knew that it had made world news and forced "Littleton, CO" into the same breath as the likes of "Jonesburo, AK", the thing that really drove it home for me was logging onto
If you've gotten this far, thanks for reading my thoughts and impressions on the matter.
Vidi, Vici, Veni
Mutually Assured Destruction is a good strategy when everyone wants to live. But against suicidal people (like the Littleton perps) or anyone else who isn't motivated by self-interest, I wouldn't count on it. As a matter of fact, a lot of the strategies we take for granted in life, just don't work when truly fucked-up people are involved. You can't reason with someone who is willing to die.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
As a teenager myself i resent what you're saying here. Parenting, environment and peer pressure have IMHO a limited effect on a person's development, which is influenced far more by the will of the person to develop his/her personality. A destructive person is someone who has deliberately chosen destructiveness; the Trenchcoat Mafia would appear from available news to have been already fascinated with violence, and it is indeed possible that in their hands DOOM, Quake, the 'net and so on were tools for reinforcing these violent tendencies. It is however almost certain that they would have been involved in something like this *even if* their parents/teachers/insert_authority_figure_here had tried to control their activities, online and in RL.
" There is a rational explanation for everything. There is also an irrational one. "
I think the best explanation that I've heard for "why?" this happens came from President Clinton hours after the shooting. These kids build up massive grievances, and no one's reaching them.
I have to admit, I've been glued to the TV when the news of these killings came on. I knew the kids at my HS who wore trench coats and were on the rifle team. They were the science fiction club. I know it's probably a generalization or a stereotype, but every high school has those kids. Does that mean that they'll snap?
I've yet to see anyone to take on the bigger problems in this case. How easy was it for these kids to get automatic weapons? How could they build a massive arsenal of guns and bombs with no one (parents, friends, teachers) noticing? Why did their classmates insist on tormenting and teasing them?
Blaming "society" and our exposure to violence is too easy an answer, and not a good enough one. The U.S. never had this problem when we were involved in Vietnam, in Korea, or World War II.
If there had been more gun control in the first place, semi-automatic weapons wouldn't be produced.
...in the US.
While I realize that the guns these kids used are illegal anyway, if they hadn't been able to get those guns, they would have easily been able to find another legal alternative.
If they hadn't been able to get illegal sawed-off shotguns, they could've gotten legal shotguns and sawed off the barrels. So you're saying that hunters shouldn't even be allowed shotguns? It's bowhunting or nothing?
Let's clarify that a semi-automatic weapon is not an automatic weapon. An automatic weapon fires continuously until the trigger is released; A semi-automatic weapon fires once every time the trigger is pulled. Yes, hunters use semi-automatic rifles; and, yes, that handgun in the nightstand is probably a semi-automatic.
You really should refrain from using racial slurs, you know; It detracts from your argument and presents you as a rather uncouth and ignorant person, which I'm sure you're not.
Since you seemed to have so elegantly missed my point, I'll elucidate for you:
Do you think that your government will manage to bypass all other checks placed upon its legislation and functioning, and become so psychotically out of control that the people of the USA will be motivated to rise up as a militia and usurp them?
The gift of death metal does not smile on the good looking.
That wasn't quite my point. I was saying that the LEGAL OWNER of the weapon should be found at least partly guilty for any crime committed with that weapon IF it is subsequently found that the weapon was not being stored in a safe and responsible way.
As for the quote from Thomas Jefferson, I'm hoping that our society has moved on somewhat from that of the 18th century.
The gift of death metal does not smile on the good looking.
You really should STUDY history rather than just regurgitating what Hollywood feeds you, you know.
Still with the racial slurs too, I see.
The gift of death metal does not smile on the good looking.
I don't think that he IS blaming the gun. The real culprits here are the two extremely disturbed children who decided to kill people they didn't like. The guns ENABLED them to kill the people that they didn't like.
As an Englishman living in the USA, the whole gun debate worries and amazes me. I can understand how guns were integrated into the American culture. However, don't you think that progress should be made on the issue for the sake of our society and our childrens safety? At the very least, don't you think that people who own guns should be made to own them RESPONSIBLY i.e. by keeping them locked up at all times? Legislation making gun owners responsible (at least in part) for tragedies enacted with their weapons may well reduce the number of legally owned weapons available to these types of disturbed individuals.
As far as your comment about '...who should have them? The government alone?', are you expecting the US people to have to rise up in an armed militia against the government any time soon?
The gift of death metal does not smile on the good looking.
Nonsense. Marijuana is illegal, cocaine is illegal, heroine are illegal and they are certainly getting made. Even if gun control was tighter, there will always be productive of semi-automatic weapons for the military. Even if for some reason U.S. gun companies completely stopped making them, then poeple would use more Soviet, Chinese, etc. made weapons.
Funny, I (by definition) am part of that militia, but I can't say I've been trained at all.
what's happening with this massacre, is the same as when a plane crashes. You have 200-500 people who die in a row, but in fact plane is far safer than car. But people just ficus on that and are afraid of planes crashing...
;-p
that's stupid to focus that way on the massacre & trying to explain things when you know nothing. But heh, if journalists were clever people, they would not do that job
The world belongs to those who get up early. - I'm far from being the king of Earth then
Ah, but the reason for the gun violence in DC was that Virginia has absurdly liberal gun laws. It's trivial to get a gun in VA and take it across the "border" to DC. Drug dealers would hire people with no criminal record to go to VA, buy a few dozen guns, and take them back to DC.
(As an aside, DC had lots more problems which led to rampant violence, besides illegal guns from VA. Lots of make-work jobs were created by Mayor Barry, who believed that make-work was better than welfare. This was all well and good, until those people who could afford to move to the suburbs did so and left for MD. Congress forbids DC from passing a commuter tax, so its tax base was shot. A good chunk of DC's land is federal government property and the feds don't give DC fair value for the land. There goes the taxes from businesses.
(So we have a city with no tax base, no middle class, and blatent mismanagement by a drug-addled mayor. Add lots of high-powered weapons coming across the border, and it's not a big surprise that DC became a disaster. There's no question that the illegal guns made it worse, though.)
VA's gun laws aren't just a problem for DC; NY police believe that gun-running from VA to NY up I-95 is the source for most of the guns in NYC.
And that's part of the problem, unforseen by Jefferson and others. 220+ years ago, laws in VA didn't have much bearing on behavior in NY. Imagine a gun-running ring where it took 3 weeks to place and order and 3 more weeks to deliver the goods! Combine that with the accuracy and firepower of 1780's guns and your enemies would die of old age before you shot them.
It's not like the Founding Fathers didn't believe in some sorts of gun control, either. I don't think they let people keep cannons for personal use. As far as I can tell, the only difference between a gun and a cannon is size. We don't let people keep atomic bombs or F-16s for personal protection. It's a matter of degree. Allowing people to own automatic or semi-automatic weapons is like allowing people to yell "Fire" in a crowded theatre.
If there's going to be a real reduction in gun violence, then this problem needs to be solved by all the states working together. As long as different states disagree on the dangers from guns, there are going to be different laws and guns are going to flow, legal or otherwise.
-jon
Remember Amalek.
There are also the criminals who are running from the law who made it to the States to start a new life. For example, the Korbel champange company was founded by three brothers, one of whom was an anarchist who was locked up in Austria-Hungary. When he escaped from prison, the brothers high-tailed it to the US. I'm sure it wasn't an uncommon pattern.
I wouldn't be surprised if the "crazy gene" (either passed along biologically or sociologically as a meme) is much more rampant among us decendants of immigrants than among the people who stayed behind in Europe.
(I know, Canada and Israel are also immigrant countries, but don't have the same crime rate. Canada has a much lower population; maybe that's a factor. Maybe it's just too cold up north ;-) Israel may attract a different flavor of crazy. It's not a perfect theory and I'm not a socialogist. But it's a thought.)
-jon
Remember Amalek.
A bit cynical about BATF, eh? ;-)
There's no need for fake IDs, just dishonest people selling guns. What seems to be happening is that certain gun sellers are known to be pretty lax about enforcing the requirement to purchase a gun. Here's a good article from the Washington Post which gives an example of how this "system" works (Post articles are only on the WWW for a couple of weeks, so if you don't read it soon, it'll be gone):
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/199 9-04/12/053l-041299-idx.html
Either way, enforcing the laws we have now makes a lot more sense then just passing more laws that the police and criminals will ignore.
I agree completely that the laws should be enforced. But certain weapons should just not be allowed for public use. It's basically impossible for me to go and buy a tank. Why is that? Because the government controls who can buy them. Does that infringe on my rights? Sometimes when I'm stuck in traffic I think it does. Most of the time, I'm glad that the jerk-off who cut me off didn't have the ability to just lob a shell at my car. I wish he didn't have the ability to buy a machine gun, either.
-jon
Remember Amalek.
The drug of choice when I was in high school was always weed. Have you ever seen someone stoned? They're sure as hell not killing anyone. Most likely they're struggling with whether or not they're too lazy to go get some munchies. LSD? possible but really really unlikely, since it only lasts 12 hours, and this episode took MUCH longer to plan. As far as scapegoats go, its not drugs either. Keep trying.
Rather, that military people have access to guns, and rather than depending on gun control laws in such a situation, you have to depend on the people in the house.
---
That's a load of bull if I ever heard it. Military personnel have access to weapons when they are assigned, yes, but you don't see Joe Schmoe the private taking home his weapon and grenade belt. That's because the military treats a weapon like a weapon.
I fail to see how a Coast Guardsmen, Marine, Sailor, Soldier or Airman has any easier access to weapon than Bubba down in Arkansas going to an unregulated gun show.
If anything, having a Military person in the house with a weapon should more than likely cause a little more safety paranoia.
Im not a psychiatrist, or a sociologist, so what Im about to say is based on my own experiences and observations.
Everyone is trying to place the blame for what has happened on one specific thing. I do not believe that this can be done...If we really want to place the blame, it falls on everyone.
Being a teenager and going to high school can be one of the hardest jobs in existence. Everyone tries to fit in and have friends, all the while their bodies are changing, hormones are raging, and emotions are going wild. Somehow, we have created a high school culture where there are strong social lines between groups of people. People fear and often hate what is different, or what they do not understand.
Belonging to a particular group may label you as an outcast, so may belonging to no group. These larger groups must assert their superiority over others, so ridicule and harassment may ensue, further separating the social groups.
Basically, we have created a culture where one group is glorified and supported, and another is ignored, labeled as outcasts, and often thought of as troublemakers. This is one factor.
But theres more
The list of causes is long:
We must start with the individual, because in this case it came down to the individual. They may have been pushed and pushed day after day, but ultimately it came down to a choice that they made. First and foremost, they are to blame. I don't know all the facts surrounding this, but there are exceptions, in the case of extreme mental illness and whatnot. But I digress.
Their parents are to blame as well, for not being more involved in their kids' life. There may be other factors that caused this... One in particular is that teenagers are difficult to communicate with and deal with, and often it is simpler just to leave them alone and hope they get better themselves. It may also be that their parents were in a situation like many other families, in which both parents work long hours just to make a living.
So for creating a situation like the latter, it is the fault of the American society that parents have to work so hard to make a living, and as a result, sacrifice time with their kids.
In addition, it is the fault of the parents of these other groups, for not teaching their children basic respect for other people. When you really look at the problems the world faces with people fighting, it all comes down to respect (actually the lack thereof). It also comes down to the other individuals in the environment, for not showing basic respect to others.
I don't believe that gun control laws would have prevented anything. We have made it illegal to buy, sell, possess, grow, process, use, etc.... Cocaine, crack, heroin, LSD, marijuana, etc...But it is not at all difficult to obtain any of these drugs. At the same time, anyone with sufficient motivation would find a way to obtain firearms, even in a strictly controlled environment.
So for this, it is the fault of whoever got the guns for those kids. Whoever they are, the should know better that 16 or 17 year olds (I don't know how old they were) have no business with a 12 gauge shotgun, or semi-auto rifles, or a 9mm semi-auto...
We can't place the blame on music, or video games, or the Internet. But what we need to understand is some of the effects that these can have. With all the TV shows, movies, video games, etc....does anyone actually think when someone dies on the screen "Oh my god, they just killed someone!"....Not really...
So, by whatever means, it is the fault of all of the above for desensitizing our society as a whole to violence.
Blame goes to the people that think of new and innovative ways to hurt, maim, kill, or blow up someone using items in the kitchen, and stuff from the hardware store. And it is their fault for making this information widely available.
It is the fault of the media for sensationalizing these kinds of incidences. Most of the world has heard of this and probably has seen the pictures of the killers by now. If someone wanted to go out in a blaze of glory, this would be the way to do it, just because they would be getting the attention of the world. I'm not saying we need no coverage, but we do need to understand where to draw the line.
But for all of these reasons combined....it still doesn't justify killing people. There is always another way.
It may be hard for some to realize, but this is the fault of everyone, for the situations we create, the information we distribute, the technology we develop, and our attitudes towards one another. It is a reflection of what we, as Americans, have become.
(The flaming may commence)
-El Guapo
For the first time in history one generation is overtaking, not succeeding, the older generation. This new generation of minds is caught between the knowledge and power that it comfortably and deftly wields and the guidance and experience it desperately needs but doesn't always get. People ask how these kids could have built up an arsenal under their parents/teachers noses but is it really that big of a surprise? These aren't the clueless kids of 50 years ago who couldn't keep a straight face when lying to their parents. When regarding technology, how many times have you seen the roles of teacher and student reversed; the children trying to teach the adults the trivial aspects of a "simple" technology that comes natural to the child. With such a perversion of roles playing out more and more is it really a surprise that other social structures are starting to show signs of stress?
Actually, there has been at least one report on these kids' home lives, a NY Times report that can be found at http://www.nytimes.com/library/national/042399colo -school-suspect.html
According to the article, "Both Harris and Klebold come from middle-class, two-parent families. Klebold's father, Thomas, is a retired geologist who runs Fountain Real Estate Management from his home. His mother, Susan, has worked for years in the local community college system, counseling disabled students, among other things." There is also a blurb about Harris' family, as well. What the article can't tell you is whether these appearances are deceiving. There is a hint that Harris had some problems at home; when he came to bat during his Little League games, he would rarely (if ever) swing at the pitches that were thrown. According to his former coach, he was not swinging due to his overwhelming fear of failure.
In any event, I agree that the parents should have been more involved in their children's lives -- at least enough to have detected an "arms buildup". However, I can't place the blame entirely on their shoulders. People in our country (USA) have a tendency to always look for a single outside factor that is to blame for tragedies such as this one, but reality is always far more complex. People are responsible for their own actions.
It used to happen 20 years ago too. Just the tools used are different.
What I mean is this: given a anti-social, violent and disturbed child who decides to do something about it, 20 years ago, access to weapons was limited (really) to knives and clubs. Access to ideas was limited to much less graphic and much less sensationalized violence than is available today.
These days the kid can get a gun and a make a bomb. They can see films and games that seem to glorify violence.
The kid is anti social already and disturbed and so, unlike most sane humans he decides he's going to do it for real instead of playing another round of Doom.
When I was younger and growing up in small town Canada, the violent kids ones got into fistfights at hockey games and in the schoolyard. We steered clear of them.
What I see here is a similar though much more extreme example. Instead of punching the crap out of some kid from another town in the name of macho, they do this atrocious act.
Why? I have a theory: Call it the influence of "natural born killers" on an already sick mind.
When I was growing up there was a strong societal bias against "Extreme" violence. No knives, no clubs. Guns were not even thought of as being used on people. They were for hunting groundhogs.
Near as I can see these kids didn't have that.
Blame that on truly disturbed kid not getting the message.
-- Perl Hack, Web Hack, SQL Hack, Guitar Hack
Well, as far as help, I don't need it now. I made it. Soon after I graduated, I left home never to return. Now, I am 30. I have been married 10 years, have a good job in IT, a couple of degrees, and many good friends. I am happy now. I don't know how my tormenters fared, because I live far from where I went to high school. I was very lucky to make it through at all though.
:-)
Actually for me larger schools were easier because I seemed to be able to find more friends at larger schools. Different stuck out more at smaller schools. I know because I moved around. As far as uniforms, well i have no experience so i will not comment.
As someone else here has stated, we need to reach out to young people who have been marginalized and let them know that life gets better, especially for nerds and geeks. Any one who tells a teenager "these are the best years of your life" should be corrected, firmly. They deserve a good kick in the teeth for saying that, but one thing we need to show young people is that violence is unacceptable even when richly deserved.
I have reached out to a few teens since then, both online and in real life, and have gained some good friends. In this way, by serving as a away to connect people who are otherwise alone, the internet can serve to make these tragedies less likely. This is not some selfless good deed on my part. I have found real friends. I don't pose as a mentor or counselor; I am just me. I get back too. Some of these disgruntled teens can really write
--- If you don't want to know the answer, don't ask the question.
High schools are places where different, unathletic kids are marginalized to the point that any opinions they express are dismissed. High school did a very good job of telling me that I did not matter at all. It did not matter that I had wonderful grades. It did not even matter that I did have a small but close group of friends.
I was humiliated repeatedly by those that were athletic and popular. I am sure each school has different little indignities that are visited upon unpopular kids. In my school, they denied simple dignities to me such as a place to sit and eat my lunch. If I tried to sit down and eat at a table first I was ridiculed and if I did not get up then I was literally pushed onto the floor. It did not matter which table either as there was a shortage at our school. They also set up pranks with me as the butt and used me as a punch line for jokes. They often stole my homework to copy it so that they could get better grades. If I complained to authorities, I was told to work on my social skills and not to be a tattletale. I fought back however I could,which amused them greatly. They made fun of my complete impotence to affect them.
But I was female. Society punishes males more for being powerless, impotent. As a female, I was trained and pressured to be less out spoken, nicer--especially because I was not pretty. I was told time and again just to take it, not make waves. I was told that I could not afford those qualities because I was already not attractive and unpopular--being outspoken as well was just antagonizing people.
I don't think that we encourage young white males just to accept impotence. I think we instill in them the American feeling that "you too can be president" and "you can make a difference" and "you matter--speak and be heard." Must be quite a shock for these boys to find out in high school that they have suddenly been marginalized as well. It is quite the double bind for them.
I don't know what triggers the violence. I do know that when you place people in double bind situations you get irrational behavior.
--- If you don't want to know the answer, don't ask the question.
I know this is a bizarre comment and I next to nothing about japanese culture, so I could be wrong on this..... but I've read that, despite freely allowing violently sexual comics and cartoons, "escort" services and graphic sex clubs in their big cities, the japanese have (by all accounts and law systems) a much, much lower rate of sexual/domestic crime than North Americans.
I believe 14 women, all young engineers were killed, the "14 Not Forgotten".
then they blamed it on video games, and now they're blaming it on the Internet. You know what would be really, really nice? If somebody found absolute, undeniable proof that one of these kids wigged out because of something he read in the Bible.
What you say about having tabs and paying attention to your kids might help the parents and the kids with resolving their differences peacefully. This would be much better then what happened in Colorado. I know that its sometime hard for kids to either fit in or talk about there problems with there parents, however the pressure should rely somewhat on the parents and not just the kids. Today is alot harder to grow up and there is alot more that they can get in trouble for and there is alot more violence that is out there for them to be exposed to. This is not putting the pressure to change the movies or games because it will always be out there whether it is legal or illgal; they will most certainly find it. The problem with hidding or banning something for kids is that they will find a thrill even if its something that they don't like to do it because of the danger.
The parents need to get involved in their life because there are many things out there that cause disrution and chaos. Think about how many time that we have seen something shot up or someone killed.. Alot huh. Well think about if we all acted out in rage aginst anyone that did something wrongful to us.. Where would we be..?? This plain fact outlines that there are many good kids that have seen just as much violence but never act out in rage.
The violence is neither about the video games thats b/s and everyone knows it. There are people out there that just want something to blame it on like: he did that because... and the reason is because... and so on and so forth.
Media coverage is outragous. I rarely see a good thing on the news whenever I pick it up and the Media smushes it in all of our faces. They have been known to put false blame on many things surrounding the effects of video games and if they cause violence or not. Many times they jump to conclusion just to make the headline or to get a story printed if they think that it will sell papers.
We need to be responsible for our actions and most are, but there is that small group that is out there that we have to worry about not the general population. However I don't believe that anyone really has the answer because I know that I don't.
I want to give my support to those families that are going through this crisis. I know that there is nothing to really say to comfort so I'll leave it at that.
It's a nice idea if it's possible. If you're a single parent (either through divorce/death/otherwise) it's a little hard to be a stay-at-home parent. I think the more important aspect of raising a child is to just be involved and be a parent as opposed to a roommate. Listen to them and don't dismiss them as a "stupid kid". Please don't get me wrong, if it's at all possible to have a parent stay with a child it's a good idea. My wife and I tried to both stay working after my son was born and she wound up quitting because it wasn't worth the money. Now we just won't buy a new car for a while or go out to eat as often or have cable TV (but that's another story). I played Doom, and D&D. I listened to heavy-metal music. I wore black cloths. I definitely wasn't the most popular person in school. I wasn't a "jock". I had easy access to guns. But my parents listened, talked, disiplined, and knew what I was doing. Well at least they new 95% of what I was doing :)
Just pray the kids never get their hands on XEvil.
Quote from the homepage: "O.K., kids... let's get this straight. XEvil is not for meek, peace-loving, "I love you, you love me..." types of people. The fans of XEvil enjoy it because of its shameless displays of blood and violence, of people getting lit on fire, getting shot, being ripped up by chainsaws, getting high on drugs, and burst open by aliens."
And the "story"? "You sinned in life. And now you must pay. Satan pits the recently deceased against each other to fight for rank in Hell. Your skill determines your fate for all eternity. This contest is known as XEvil."
A lot of people would FREAK OUT if this game got popular among teens. Dunno why it isn't already -- you can get it on Windoze as well as the almighty X. But, of course, like DOOM, it's only a game -- not that that would stop the Christian fundamentalists from trying to get it banned in the US.
I don't think you can blame Doom, Marilyn Manson (at this point, I consider him a glam rocker, though still pretty dark), or Rammstein (Herzeleid is better than Sehnsucht, BTW -- IMHO) for this. You have to blame the parents first for not raising the kids to know right from wrong and the schools second for not teaching right and wrong.
Glückwünsche, haben Sie Slashdot ermordet, indem Sie zum korporativen Druck beugten und Subskriptionen einlei
On our own, we would have lost what??
Do you honestly think the Germans or the Japanese could have crossed the Atlantic or the Pacific, laneded a force of sufficent size, and conquered the United States?
You're right, you wouldn't been speaking German today. It would probably be Russian.
Germans conquer Britian. Weakened Germany falls to Russia. Dosvedanya, Folks!
Maybe a year later we drop a few H-bombs on New Moscow and start the clean-up process.
Check out Largest recipe database on the web.
Our founding fathers didn't trust the government and resorted to "violence" to end British rule.
The 2nd Amendment was put in specifically to insure the ordinary citizen would never be disarmed and subject to an unjust government.
Thank God I live in a state of Wisconsin, which just recently ratified an amendment to the constitution reaffirming the rights of ALL law abiding citizens to keep and bear arms.
As a result, all local statutes that restricted gun ownership/purchases, that went above and beyond state laws, were instantly repealed.
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Actually it would be a "ethnic" slur. Unless of course the British have splintered off the Caucasian race without telling anybody.
Though, that would explain the tendency of the average Brit to be quite homely-looking and in great need of dental care.
Maybe you guys are sucking on too many limes and its rotting your teeth out. Hmmm, go figure.
-- A Yank armed to the teeth (a full set of teeth mind you)
Check out Largest recipe database on the web.
I am 16, in public high school and have often been accused of being the dark, scary type of person who would do something like that. I am actually about as anti-violence as one can get I avoid fighing at all costs. Yes, I spend the majority of my time on the Internet. Yes, I am a loner at school. No, I would not shoot people or blow up the school. I think that what was done in Colorado was wrong and misguided but I do understand the feelings and emotions behind the students who did it. We, the silent lurkers are made to feel like second class citizens to the "beautiful people" sure, teacher and "adults" tell us that this improves after we get out of the cruel world of high school but that doesn't make it any better right now. Unfortunatly, because of the extremely violent way the students in Colorado chose to deal with this all the focus will be on finding out what is wrong with the rather then the wrongs around them that caused it.
Ryan Dorman, CCNA Network Communications Specialist Millersville Univesrity
people are just psychopathic, whether it be genetic or a mental illness, some people have an inbuilt desire to hurt and to kill.
Well said, I completely agree. But what good does taking away our right to bear arms? Of course children should not have guns, if that is all you're saying I agree. But if you are trying to say that removing our right as adults to own guns you are way off.
If, as you said, some people are just evil, then without guns would they be any less evil? of course not. They had guns, it made it easier for them to kill unarmed students, but they could easily have found other means..chlorine bombs? Sure, now we illegalize chlorine and coca cola. What if they decided just to steal a bulldozer and plow through the cafeteria? illegalize bulldozers?
My point is, some people are just plain evil. Whether it was at birth, through upbringing, or they just simply snapped for some unknown reason, it was done, they were evil, and they no longer live. Speculation does nothing but brainwash and sell newspapers.
Once I thought I was wrong...I was mistaken.
It's another little-publicized fact that government figures record no confirmed fatalities at all due to handguns in 1998, and only 23 due to long weapons (rifles, shotguns, "assault rifles", etc.)
Interesting numbers. Can you point me to a location where they can be verified, or at least a location which would reference the original FBI sources?
--
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Victor Danilchenko
Look, the problem of the media Katz criticised is making conclusion or opinion too easy. I would say he's correct not to make yet-another-explanation to this situation.
My opinion is: bad-gun-control + bad parenting + bad education philosophy.
WHat's yours?
A sig is redundant.
one embarks upon an course of murder/suicide only after one does not believe in hell.
our society is very careful to train everyone that not only is hell a useless myth, but that it is something no "good" diety would have anything to do with. the whole concept of good and evil has been systematically replaced with some kind of amoral clinical psychology.
the notion that a "good" diety would not enforce justice beyond the grave does violence to the whole concept of justice. Kant argued that in order for any kind of morality or justice to be meaningful, some cosmic ref must assign penalties and force repayment in the hereafter all unpaid debts of the here and now.
we live in a society of feckless relativism. that's why we're surprised at the metaphor shear of being slapped in the face by evil.
why do kids like that go shoot up the school? they were evil. they'll burn in hell. the'll get what they deserve, nothing more, nothing less.
Hmm seems that guns are your scapegoat. Blame the killers and not the tools. These kids built bombs and killed and maimed many of thier vitims with common household items. Where is your cry to ban propane cylinders and nails. If a person really wants to kill they will find a way. Baseball bats and hockey sticks are deadly weapons too. Check the police blotters to see the number of ppl who's weapon of choice is a pool cue or beer mug. The kids killed ppl. We need to look at the causes not the means.
Gag-a-maggot! It seems that information is dangerous. The main weapons used were pipe bombs and shotguns. The ones in the news clips were break action double-barrels. These are not semi-automatic weapons. The facts seem to get overlooked that these kids went to great lengths to prepare to kill people. Then they did.
/. too!
BTW I do keep a loaded pump action shotgun in my bedroom and live in a very rural area. I have used it more varments in the sheep-pens than on people but on five occations in 15 years I've had to use it to eject ppl from my property. Funny thing is all the ppl I've sent packing didn't leave and acted aggressive until they discovered I was armed.
And yes ppl in the country read
I don't think privacy is a right. As a child, I didn't buy any of the things I used. My parents have as much right to look on a computer in their house as I do now in my own now that I am living on my own. There may be good reasons to permit a certain amount of privacy to children, but it is certainly not a right in any real sense of the word.
Logic ... merely enables one to be wrong with authority. -- Doctor Who
Actually, it's second to fertilizer (Oklahoma City).
On American soil, perhaps, but the A-bomb takes all comers for what has been done in far less than a day.
Logic ... merely enables one to be wrong with authority. -- Doctor Who
wow, that's a generalization if i ever saw one. come on, i know plenty of people in the military who don't have guns in their homes.
That's not how I took that statement. Rather, that military people have access to guns, and rather than depending on gun control laws in such a situation, you have to depend on the people in the house.
Logic ... merely enables one to be wrong with authority. -- Doctor Who
I'm not sure where you got these numbers from. I suggest you compare the distribution of violent crimes against income level. Not that I am condoning violence by the poor, but your comment smacks a little bit of rascism.
Blar.
I was happy to see Jon writing for Slashdot at first; I'd enjoyed much of his previous work on Hotwired. But after the strange diversions on sexbots and Microsoft - which seemed to be completely out-of-character, apparent experiments at finding the water level here - it seems he's now gone back to what he does best: thinking out loud.
I'm not concerned about his writing ability; the average is high. I'm not concerned about his ideas: he's quite a deep thinker. But nowadays I'm getting really, really bored by the length and monotonous pace of these unedited pieces. Much as I hate killfile stuff, I'm going to have to cut him out now; I just haven't got the time to sift thru the murk for gems. (I'll remember you for the better stuff, Jon - goodbye and thanks.)
- Read fiction at www.espressostories.com
Wasn't the kid's father a marine? No amount of gun control would have kept the guns out of that house. Where the gun control is necessary is in the house, not at the store.
Why is it so rare that people point out that school itself is the biggest cause of these massacres? You imprison innocent children for 10 years between the ages of 6 and 16 and force them to take abuse and guilt the whole time they're there. Is it any wonder that they go nuts? The only difference between these two and many other children is that they killed others just before commiting suicide.
Is there any place in the world where primary / secondary school is publicly available and voluntary?
The media doesn't report on schoolyard baseball bat massacres in the US. However, in China, where guns are illegal, baseball bats and knifes are the weapons of choice. And there are just as many, if not more homicides using these weapons instead of guns in China than the US.
Gun control is learning how to aim better.
The only thing stopping the government from rounding us up and getting rid of "undesirables" is the fact that there ARE so many guns in the US. If you think getting rid of guns will make us all safer, then you need to look at the situation in Kosovo a little closer. Those citizens don't have guns, and look at what is happening to them...
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I run BeOS. The rules don't apply.
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I run BeOS. The rules don't apply.
Let's say you are of small stature, of Lawful/Good alignment, and minding your own business. If someone large and evil comes at you with a baseball bat, do you want to (a.) call 911 and wait while being beaten to death, (b.) cower in fear while being beaten to death, or (c.) defend yourself? And if not with a gun, then what? Evil people do exist - guns are usually (90% or more) used to disuade evil deeds with no shots fired.
Australia has had all sorts of armed crimes go up since they had the law-abiding turn in most of their weapons. The bad guys ignore gun laws, and the laws end up disarming the good guys only.
Well, then it would have been more illegal to possess them, so . . . .
Oh wait. Never mind.
:P
--
Okay, I got Linux installed. So where's the free beer everyone keeps talking about??
Careful, you just opened yourself up for some "religious nut" bashing.
:P
However, I agree with you. I don't claim to be Christian, but any dork can look at Christ's teachings and realize that there's some darn good advice to be had in them. The same dork can also easily see that far too many Christians just don't get it.
--
Okay, I got Linux installed. So where's the free beer everyone keeps talking about??
I never said he did have a monopoly, nor did I say that everything he said was golden. I just said that he had some good ideas. That by no means was meant to imply that no one else* has any good ideas. That would be silly.
:P I agree with you, AC --how they get there doesn't matter at all. I do wish they'd get on the road soon, though. Bleah.
I think the human race needs a serious influx of respect, sympathy, and empathy for lots of things, not just one another.
*with the possible exception of L. Ron Hubbard.
--
Okay, I got Linux installed. So where's the free beer everyone keeps talking about??
You never see this happen in Switzerland either were everyone has a hand gun. Its not the laws on guns that are the problem. Its not the games, movies , or anything else either. Scapegoats are only good for political gains. Blame the mental state of the person doing the shooting, which in this case we can't because they committed suicide.
There are people out there that get a high on hurting, even killing people, just like there are people who get a high off of living a clean life. We just need to remember this is not a perfect world and we are not perfect people, so why do we all act as if there is such a thing as Utopia?
"Imagination is more important than knowledge" -- Albert Einstein
Hello! Is anybody in there?
This is a typical anti-gunner response to a horrific tragedy. Why do you people immediately want to ban hand-guns, or toughen the laws, or whatever...in a situation like this.
First, as far as I've heard, these cowardly little freaks only had long guns - I've heard no mention of pistols, but I might be wrong on this. So there goes your long gun theory.
Second, as far as I'm aware, it is illegal for persons under 21 to even by handgun ammo, let alone a handgun. There's also strict laws on posession for folks under 21. These guys were 18...
There's all sorts of laws restricting firearms as it is. Most of the time, if you examine a tragedy like this, you'll see that had the LAWS on the books been followed/enforced, the tragedy would never have happened.
So let's throw more laws on the books. Laws that will hamstring law-abiding citizens. Because you know what, some punk bent on a suicidal rampage doesn't give a rats ass about the laws.
Maybe I'm smoking crack, but my interpretation of the 2nd amendment is that the populace has a right to bear arms to keep the government, more specifically power hungry politicians. in check. If the people in power start to get a little overzealous in their power struggle, there's an armed populace that keeps them from getting their way. Anyone who doesn't believe this could happen in this day and age isn't a very good student of history.
Granted there are nut cases out there who abuse the right and innocent people get hurt. That's the way freedom works, it's called responsibility.
Are you asleep? The bible is full of bloodshed and violence. It's just easier for theists to accept (and embrace) it if it's in the name of their god.
My point is not to make the bible a scapegoat, but to give you a gentle rebuke.
Yes, everyone's scrambling about trying to moderate their kid's involvement in manson, the net, etc. and yet they constantly drill their kids minds with this religious fanaticism. We HAVE documented proof of the blood that has been spilled in the name of religion.
Why can't the media see it for what it is....as the media (television and the likes) have showered the news with the incident since it started almost non-stop, maybe kids who have some family or social problems are getting these ideas from the media. They see it being done and think, "That's a great idea lets start planning one that'll even be bigger than that." I mean they try to blame it on music like KMFDM, and other bands, but why isnt everyone who listens to these bands killing
people?
I just feel the media have taken reporting news a little too far.
The real problem is that these kids that go on killing spree's have a more deeper psycological problem. Parents and relatives, and friends however do not understand it and have to blame it on movies, games, internet, magazines, books, anything and everything they can, just so that they won't feel responsible for what their children did... Media is the same way, they interview the parents of the killers and victims, and report that it has to be the online community, games, movies, etc... that is contributing to this massacre. People use that as an excuse when they can't explain the real truth.
The day Microsoft creates a product that doesn't suck, it will be known as the Microsoft Vaccuum Cleaner!
It was pretty scary hearing the chief investigator tell Jim Lehrer that the internet was an "underregulated resource". But maybe not too much cause for worry, because most public officials seem to think that all resources available to the public are underregulated.
But the biggest threat to the internet probably doesn't come from public prosecutors and the anti-erotica crowd: the biggest threat comes from Linux and MP3. Why? Because these are stepping on the toes of some wealthy and very well entrenched economic special-interest groups, and wouldn't be nearly so big a threat to them without the internet. Furthermore, it's likely that other such innovations will follow. So I expect that said interest groups will soon jump in bed with the hand-wringers and moralizers to form a large, powerful coalition calling for extreme regulation of content.
If this happens, and if they get their way, the internet will end up becoming just another TV-style medium for force-feeding commercials to the masses; there won't be any allowance for individuals who want to use it for creative/constructive purposes.
That's my fear, but not it's not a done deal yet. Educate your friends, relatives, and public officials.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Okay, then how do you make laws against home-
made pipe bombs, knives, axes, or other tools
that can kill?
It's not the tool's fault it was used to kill.
It was the complete responsibility of the user.
If there are no guns, these psychopaths will
just use other devices, or even more likely,
get them illegally. What, you think while they
are planning to do such an illegal act as
MURDER that they will stop when stealing a
gun will also be considered illegal? Please...
--- witty signature
because it's already happened. Do you think the bible thumpers are going to let the media speak bad of organized religion?
let's go down the list:
The crusades.
Jonestown
Waco/Branch Dividian
I'm sure others out there can think of tons of others, all in the name of some faceless "God."
since these things started happening, i've had but one opinion on the matter.
it's the media's fault.
okay, i'll admit that it's not entirely the media's fault - they didn't give the kids guns and instructions to kill - but they might as well have. one kid, and it only takes ONE, gets the idea that getting his dad's shotgun out of the closet and going to school to take revenge on the people that persecuted him all year long would be an excellent solution to his low self-esteem.
hell haven't we ALL thought about it? wouldn't it be just SOO satisfying? what keeps US from doing it is the fact that we're still young and we really don't want to spend the next 50-60 years behind bars (among other things).
what the media does is put the fact that this kid out in po-dunk USA has done this, and now it's all over national news for everyone to see - including those kids who otherwise wouldn't have even thought about it. have you checked the news lately? can you turn the channel without having to see SOMETHING on this? i was at work at the time, but i'm pretty sure my wife got to see LIVE coverage of the event. AS IT HAPPENED. ON NATIONAL TELEVISION.
sure, it's newsworthy, but...they should have some moral obligation to the people. kids have enough to worry about, let alone trying to figure out if the loner/geek/nerd sitting next to them today is going to blow their head off tomorrow.
but that's just my opinion...i could be wrong.
der dee der.
Man, going out for one night w/ a girl is hard enough... Plus I think I save some major cash not going..
He stated in this posting about how that poorer people are less violent... Umm.. Ever been to San Jose, Ca? I used to live in that area. It's a lower class area. Very trashy in lots of place, and the violence is way up there. The media just broadcast this, becuase it's all to common it wouldn't shock the public.. When some rich white boy goes nuts, they have a hay day..
"The pen is mighter than the sword... But what if you can't write?"
I ate my tag line.
-=Ellis (D)25=-
We need a grammer one too...
That was supposed to be, The media just doesn't broadcast this.....
"The pen is mighter than the sword... But what if you can't write?"
I ate my tag line.
-=Ellis (D)25=-
Ack, Ken and Barbie.. (I have heard the barbie thing one to many times, stupid parents)... But talking about fitting everyone in Texas would be hard to do. One, after living here 6 years I have found out that Texas is not a desert that most people would like to believe.. There are probably 20 lakes that surround me with in 100 mile radius. Then there are alot more ponds, rivers and creeks. It would hard to make people live in water..
"The pen is mighter than the sword... But what if you can't write?"
I ate my tag line.
-=Ellis (D)25=-
So what you are saying is that the higher class people are suppossed to be immuned from the problem which plaque the lower class people? If so, you haven't been much in the higher class and seen what really happens. I say a comic in mad magazine about it, quite funny.. It went into detail about how the upper class covers their problems and make it look nice and purty..
Ie, In the lower class if you have a frige full of beer, you are an drunk bastard... If you are in the upper class and have a wine celler, they say that you have a well stocked basement of fine wines..
The stereo type is that the upper class is suppossed to be more civilized and all that... But what really happens is that the classes are arranged by how much money you are worth..
So Jim-Bo 'Chicken Chaser' Bob wins the lottery is instantly part of the upper class.. Which would be totally oppisite of the general stereo type of the upper class being so eligant and blah blah blah.
The upperclass has alot of stress put up on them, and they mask it over, trying to act like the best in the world, but we all know what happens when you bottle your emotions, you explode. I'm surprised that we don't see more the upperclass exploding everyday.
The class are not much diffrent when it comes to this, every person has emotions and they do get angry, it's just how they take the route on getting over this anger.
Killing is un-civilized and that is why they can't believe that the rich kiddies are now doing it, but since when has civilation been civilized? I feel that this will happen when all the idiots kill them selfs off....
"The pen is mighter than the sword... But what if you can't write?"
I ate my tag line.
-=Ellis (D)25=-
Is any one going to sue Satan? Muahahhaa.. Ok.. I know.. Bad commenent.. Just trying to make myself laugh...
I don't think there have been any case which they try to sue Satan.. I wonder how many wackos would pop up saying that they are satan.. That would be funny as fuck.. Ok.. I'm just going insane, so bare w/..
"The pen is mighter than the sword... But what if you can't write?"
I ate my tag line.
-=Ellis (D)25=-
Children as seen as property... So basically they are not entitled to rights.. You have no rights till you are 18... And still you can't drink till age of 21, then to run for president you have to 35.... Even dead people have rights....
"The pen is mighter than the sword... But what if you can't write?"
I ate my tag line.
-=Ellis (D)25=-
Hahaha.. Mine was in 97...
"The pen is mighter than the sword... But what if you can't write?"
I ate my tag line.
-=Ellis (D)25=-
I lived in Cali for 13 years.. I know about population. The Dallas/Ft. Worth area is getting filled w/ population, it's not like it's crowded, it's the infrastucture that make living here a bitch.. 45 mph 2 lane high-ways, houses being put up all over, no 7-11's with in walking distance, schools are over 5 miles away, the drivers suck.... I can go on about the Native Texan driver..
"The pen is mighter than the sword... But what if you can't write?"
I ate my tag line.
-=Ellis (D)25=-
That's funny, because a whois lookup of trenchcoatmafia.org and trenchcoatmafia.net both have the following listed:
Billing Contact:
Troche, Jose domain name for sale (JDT92)
.com on the other hand (and arguably the most important) is registered by someone else, who may well be keeping it from being exploited.
Who here remembers back in the 80's when a couple of TV movies came out about the the horros of D&D ? I really wish I could get a hold of those movies or even remember their names as they would be great fun to watch, they would be right in cult status like Reefer Madness.
:)
It's been a long time, but I vaguly remember the movies showing a bunch of kids playing D&D in a basement and they were all having hallucinations (maybe they were taking LSD while playing as well) and one of the kids thought he could fly because his character could and so he dove off the roof.
It was really stupid, but looking back it's no different than what is going on now. And in response to one of the AC's posts, I agree that schools are to blame, not guns, bombs, internet, video games, etc... If the school system wasn't designed to create a clique environment and make people feel inferior, things like this wouldn't happen as often. The over emphasis of sports and gym in school, automatically creats a lesser class of people to be shunned and made fun of if they can not perform as well in those activities. While I do not advocate killing people and feel what the two kids did was wrong, I can totally justify their feelings towards being mistreated by jocks and preps.
As a side note, being from Canada, I do find it interesting that there has not been any school shootings despite exposure to the same violent media, I honistly did not know that statistic. I think that in itself says something (although I don't know exactly what) about Canada's policy on gun control and how it is a good thing.
No flames from NRA members please, I live with one
I'm pretty fly for a white guy
Also how many people thing that if this exact same scenario had not happeend at some white-bread, middle class, beaver cleaver school, but instead had happened at some inner city, most black/latino high school, the press wouldn't have even given it a 10th of the coverage.
I'm pretty fly for a white guy
Scotland, 1997 Not sure of the exact details of this one, but Tony Blair was speaking about it on television last night
This was a particularly grizzly one.
An adult lunatic with an AK-47 stormed into an elementary school gymnasium full of kindergartners. ALL adults in the gym (3 or 4 people) perished as did several kindergartners.
And, of course, the UK has some of the most restrictive gun ownership laws on planet earth. Those laws didn't stop this guy!
Sorry folkes, but....
We don't have this trouble (at least not as often or to the same extent) over here in England. Why? Simple, WE DON'T ***ALL*** HAVE GUNS OR AMPLE ACCESS TO THEM. If you guys over there had any sense - you would BAN GUNS. I mean, if a guy breaks into your house, is that any reason to shoot him? If someone threatens you, if they don't have a gun and you don't have a gun....... etc.
Yes I know there will always be access to guns on the "black market", but not quite the same level of access.
SET AN EXAMPLE TO YOUR YOUNGSTERS - BAN GUNS TO YOURSELVES. ONLY THEN WILL THEY REALISE THAT IT ISN'T COOL.
Just a point.
http://www.jonmasters.org/
F**K off and leave the good folkes at Slashdot alone.
http://www.jonmasters.org/
Banning guns would not have stopped this from happening. The fact is, just because it would be illegal, doesn't mean they couldn't get guns. Pot is illegal to posses, and look how easy it is to get that. If someone wants to kill, they will find a gun, especially people as screwed up as these two kids were. I honestly think that prevention starts at home. I read a good quote in a newspaper recently. It said "Kids who love and who are loved do not murder". Love is taught, but so is hate. I'd be willing to bet that if the parents of these two were involved in their life in a loving way from day one, none of this would have happened.
-B
Im not often a 'me too'-er, but in this case I've got to say that my first reaction to seeing this piece was "I wonder if Katz can shed any more insight or ideas on this subject than those expressed yesterday". Having read his piece, I really don't think that he has added anything to the already very large response received on Slashdot.
Was this article really any better written, or making any better points than many of the pieces posted yesterday? Personally I think that this piece would have been better posted as a Slashdot user comment.
A little planning goes a long way...
with this comment JonKatz's article "Why Kids Kill" is going into the Slashdot Hall of Fame and the first story ever to get 1095 responses.
first of many, Jon! I am sure!
I was thinking of how to intentionally fail my drug test... It would make a good memoir story someday.
I think the recent killings are different than those prior. I'd especially draw a line between incidents where the kids kill their parents and where they only kill peers. Kids from middle class, "good" families kill their peers in "perfect" suburbia because this environment is a pressure cooker for adolescents.
In "perfect" suburbia, there is no escape from the fact that you don't fit in. There is no escape from ridicule, abuse, threats and the daily victimization that goes on for years in the lives of many many kids around the country. In a big city there are places to escape, other things to do. In suburbia, you can't even go to a movie or the arcade without all the kids from your school being right there, without all the ridicule being right there. Computers and fantasy games are common passtimes among these kids because it's their only escape.
These killers came from middle class families in a middle class community where they'd been told all their life that they should be smart, do well in school, be polite and respectful of girls and they'd get ahead. They found themselves doing all the right things, and getting shat on for it. In that position, at that age, without the perspective of adulthood, the whole world begins to feel like a lie and a sham. There's no such thing as "kids stuff" at this age, because there's no big picture yet. School is your life, and in the emotional confusion of adolescence it's easy to lose sight of the light at the end of the tunnel, and just how close that end is.
These kids weren't noticed as problems because they weren't violent or maladjusted to begin with. They were the daily victims of violent and maladjusted kids, and they were just expected to take it and push on through. Nearly everybody else does, but these kids didn't have the steam valves in their life and they burst under the strain instead.
Nobody would've noticed, or even been surprised, if these kids had just quietly killed themselves. All the reasons were there. What they decided to do instead was inexcusable, absolutely unforgivable, but sadly understandable. It seems more a testament to the success of our society so far that this doesn't happen on a monthly basis.
More than anything, what these kids needed was some perspective. They needed somebody to take them aside and tell them that in a year or two they'll be in college. They'll hit puberty, their intelligence will be valued, and high school will seem like a distant dream. The jocks will be pumping gas or in jail, and college girls will want somebody who can help them with calculus. When they get out of school, they'll be making big $$ at a respected job while those other kids are selling shoes. Tell them that, yes, high school sucks, it's a huge sham and a lie, but that your life hasn't even started yet, and these jerks you have to deal with are going to spend the rest of their lives wishing they were back in high school while you leave them in the dirt on the way to new frontiers with experiences and people so vivid and exciting that they make h.s. look like a puppet show.
We need a Slashdot young professional "You're drinking milk!" outreach program to reach young nerds before they crack.
Making tougher gun laws is NOT going to solve anything. Criminals will still have guns, that's part of why they are criminals.
Do you have any idea how EASY it is to get an illegal weapon (eg. full auto weapons). Fully automatic weapons were outlawed back in 1986 or 1988. Over 10 years ago. You can pick up a MAC-10, or an old full auto Uzi no problem. And I live in Minneapolis. Minneapolis, for the most part, is not a high crime area.
So, if I can get a weapon that was outlawed 10 years ago, what makes you think that outlawing handguns, or any other currently legal weapon, would prevent people from getting them?
We've got some serious problems with our society, but we do need to look into it more. Taking guns away is only gonna prevent non-criminals from having them.
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This is true, you can get a permit, but they do run a VERY extensive background check. A guy I met at a gun show applied for one, and it took him about a year to finally get it. The BATF can come into your house and search it at any time they want if you have a permit for a fully auto weapon. Most of the time, the only way for you to get a permit is if you actually owned one of the weapons before 1986 or so, and your background check comes back spotless.
I do speak from experience... though I never purchased one, several people have offered to sell me full auto weapons. Mostly at gun shows, but a couple of people I used to know in high school also. They were both arrested for various firearm related crimes. Point is, it's easy to get them if you really want to, and making a law to ban firearms isn't going to solve anything.
If you actually do succeed in limiting the amount of weapons available to criminals, you may be asking for more trouble. On one hand you may have less public shootings, but on the other hand, the criminals may resort to other methods of mass killing, like bombs or poison in the water supply. Look at how many buses and buildings get blown up in the Middle East, Ireland, and other such places. Guns are not as easy to get in those places, but making homemade bombs out of a few chemicals is easy enough to do. I would say a large bomb going off in a large building is WAY more catastrophic than some psycho unloading 50 rounds into a crowd of people. Just look at the OK City bombing, or the World trade center. In Minnsota a couple of years ago, 2 guys got arrested for manufacturing and conspiring to poison the water supply of some city. They made like 4 drops of this stuff, which if placed in the cities water supply would have been potent enough to kill anyone who drank the water.
Our society is seriously fucked up, and there has to be a better solution.
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I think technology like the internet can exacerbate problems by making it easier for people to get access to information. Apparently the bombs they set in the school were pretty sophisticated. Yes, they probably could have got the same information from the public library, but it is a whole lot easier to just do a search on lycos.
Similarly with the proliferation of guns in the US. Banning guns would not have stopped them from trying to kill other students. However, if they were much more difficult/expensive to obtain and they had to resort to knives or baseball bats then a lot less people would have died and been injured. I'd suggest even if they still had pipe bombs but no guns, they wouldn't have been able to kill as many people.
Aiming for a society where `Everyone just gets along with each other' may seem like an unrealistic goal. But, hey, this is what happens and will continue to happen as long as people end up feeling isolated and hated by the rest of their community.
HOLY SHIT. ALMOST 1000 COMMENTS! YEAH!!!! KEEP POSTING!!
--
"Fuck you" - me
Perhaps you have never read the Bible. Go home tonight and read Judges 19. Here's the basic gist of it:
Guy takes a concubine, she misses her family and runs back home. He tracks her down and starts to take her back home. On the way back they stop in a town. The men of the town all want to have sex with HIM, but this old guy takes him in to protect them. Well, the folks in the town threaten to beat down the door if he doesn't come out, so they throw the concubine outside. The men of the town rape here repeatedly, and then go home. She dies from her wounds, and the guy finds her body the next morning. He cuts her body into eleven pieces and sends one to each of the other tribes of Israel, who start a war against the tribe of Benjamin and wipe out all but 600 of the male Benjamites.
The theme of judges of course is that the people were living in a new land, they had no king, and they didn't seek the will of the lord, and here is the sort of thing that happened as a result.
However, it's naive to say that people can't take something in the bible and use it as a justification for their own evil. Perhaps you remember the Crusades? Or a certain Balkan nation filled with Orthodox Christians who are trying to exterminate an entire people group as we speak?
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I tried to read the article, but I saw no reason to read it. I can get a better summary on the news, and there are no new ideas within. Katz asks a whole pile of questions, and then looks to mass media for answer to them, criticizing them for their lack, but never proposes any of his own. Why does Katz post a long winded summary like this?
I realize he may be trying to encourage discussion, but why now just come right out and do this.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
I have read a lot of these articles, and just about everything has been said, but it is here and there. A lot of people want to blame guns, the internet, the other kids, the parents, ectera. A few want to blame them all. Many say "it is not such and such, it is this other factor." Several i think have hit the nail on the head, or come close.
What kind of parent doesn't know that his or her kid is building that many bombs in the basement? Yeah kids can hide a lot from thier parents, but there were WAY too many bombs in that school to reasonably be able to hide them all.
I am a frshman in college now, but i remember middle school and the bigging of high school very well. i was picked incredibly, i have lived though more preasure than anything i have heard in the news suggests these kids experienced at the hands of thier peers. We cannot and should not expect better from high schoolers, we call them kids for a reason, they are still learning to be mature and avoid giving such abuse. Considering adult culture and how much happens in it from road rage to gossip, some never figure it out.
Guns have been available through out this countries history. And while it is so common it is starting to lose it's meaning, guns don't kill people. Indeed, becuase of guns fewwer people were killed in this tradgedy, cause since they did not call in a bomb threat, no one would have found the bombs spread though out the school if the kids had not come in shooting, and the whole school and all the kids in it wouldahve blown up. Are we going to put waiting periods on pipes and propane tanks now? They would have been far deadlier than any gun if they had exploded.
Games and movies do not make people kill each other. They may make violent tendencies more dominant, but even that lacks proof. These things, all the things i have mentined, are mere symptoms of the problem. Our culture. If these kids had believed in the God of any ofthe world's major religions, they would not have done this. If this society did not make it seem wrong to believe in God, to teach morality (all religions teach not to kill), then this would never have happened. Teachers are afriad to disapline. Parents don't want to stife the child's creativity and independence. So where does a child learn to cope with moral delemas? Who can he or she go to to ask about right and wrong if morality is self-defined? Obviously they did not think it wrong, obviously their self-defined code allowed for this ultimate revenge.
Almost every one wants to blame some specific item in our culture, because so few are willing to admit that thier values or lack thereof, might contribute to this behavior. Guns would be less prevelent if people did not feel a need for them, or did not obess over them. And anyway, some of the stats I have been hearing on the news indicate that violent crime is LOWER in states that allow citizens to carry weapons however they please. Violence would be less common in movies, music and games if there was no market for it. These things REFLECT the culture that those kids lived in, they do not cause it.
I owe nearly everything I have to two incredible parents and even though it is quite a while off, I am going to ensure that my children have every opportunity that I have had and more.
Too many parents don't realize what a huge responsibility they have taken on. Littleton is an example of just how bad it can get if you don't take that responsibilty seriously.
In all things moderation.
It amazes me the comment from Americans who are of the opinion that it is good to have that many gun's in society. Why on earth is it good to have a TEC 9 other than to kill people, it's no use for hunting.
A survey on abcnews.com 9% said that gun's were to blaim. Gun's are not to blaim, their availability is.
One day America will wake up and move to move UK type anti-gun laws, ie: no guns for anyone. Only after hundreds of thousands of more deaths...
Right On!
We are more and more entering a state where people do not take any personal repsonsibility. Nor do they expect others to do so. These kids pulled the triggers, they made the bombs, but everyone is talking about doom's influence instead of focusing on the kids. Hey maybe it's hard to do a news hour without pulling in so much unrelated stuff.
/*---------------------------*/
Man? What is man?
But a collection of chemicals with delusions of granduer.
So us young adults are sub-human now eh?
:/
IMO the only diff between me and you is that you are a few years older, and possibly wiser, altho with that attitude it is doubful.
i have a right to privacy. it is in the canadian charter of rights and freedoms. i understand its in the american consitition as well.
i have played wolf3d, doom, duke3d, quake, quake2, and numerous other violent shoot-em-up type games. But i don't go out and kill people. nor will i. it i just something i have been taught as wrong. in this case i wouldn't be suprised if it was parent neglgance that set this off.
but thats not my point. i just want to know why you are so down on kids, i mean, buzz cuts and uniforms? thats just gonna get us p*ssed off and make us mader. as it is we got screwed with having to clean up this planet which the gernertions before us more or less destroyed. now you seem to want us all to be mindless unthinking duplicates of each other.
ok, capital punishment. it has its merits, but not with the drill-instructor-with-a-horse-whip format. i am a non violent person. but that would make me want to lash out.
ah well, this is ranty, but i think you get the point.
pest
This is something I sent to some friends last night, but it applies here as well:
I was in the scapegoat role for 2 1/2 years at a certain Seattle elementary school (before that I went to a school where I was reasonably average in the popularity standings, and after that in junior high things were ok -- it was just those 2 1/2 years that were hell).
I was kicked, punched, and verbally abused on a daily basis during my years at that school, for no particular crime other than being the new poor kid who showed up in mid-semester (and the reason I transferred in midyear was because of an abuse situation at my previous school -- a fourth grade
teacher who basically went off the deep end but couldn't be fired for his abusive behavior because of his seniority (!). 4 of us ended up being
transferred to other schools because the situation was so serious. Let's just say I was a little traumatized by the whole thing). All the
neighborhood kids at my new school (this was pre-busing) were either blond and went to the Lutheran church or they were Irish and went to Our Lady of The Lake. I was all and none of the above and I didn't live in the neighborhood. Maybe that was all it took to become the punching bag.
When I ended up in the principal's office after being beat up, I was told "You must be doing something to egg them on." Apparently walking down the hall trying not to make eye contact makes you deserve to get kicked and hit and have your schoolwork strewn about the rainy playground. I learned pretty damn quickly that I would not be getting any support from the school: not from the principal, not from the teachers, not from the
counselors. All I could do was wait for it to end.
Sometimes I think that the school administration *encouraged* the cliques in the school; perhaps they thought the clearly-defined hierarchy of students made their jobs easier. I don't know. I certainly didn't see much sympathy from them and I was going through a lot of pain. They seemed to buy into the whole hierarchy as if it was *right.* This includes most of the teachers, too.
I wish that people would maybe try to emphasize that so-called typical childhood cruelty is something that shouldn't be tolerated. So what if
"kids are just that way"? Why not try to teach them a little empathy?
Some of the reactions I've seen to the Littleton thing seem to imply that being different is wrong and that perhaps these kids should have tried harder not to be outsiders. Why don't people look at it the other way -- maybe the insiders should try harder not to *create* outsiders?
//
I agree: You can't spell.
The reason why it's a ritual is because people behave the same way every time it happens.
D&D and Ozzy Osbourne are different from New Media and movies. If you really mean this hasn't chaged in a long time, then you're saying journalists were scapegoating the Internet long before the web was invented!
It's generally acknowledged that crime is going down in almost every context. Can YOU cite research showing otherwise?
In my highschool days, I was in many ways similar to the denver shooter's profiles: I was active on the early incarnation of the net, loved DOOM, was interested in world history, particularily wars. I was antisocial and wasn't popular at school, especially with the Jocks. I even wore a trench coat and hung out with proto-goths for a while. Going further, I had access to some pretty powerful weapons and built things that went "bang" with ammonium nitrate and fuel oil. As far as I know, I have never shot anyone, or gone on a killing rampage. In fact, the net actually facilitated an outlet for my frustrations. The whole 31337 movement, early BBS' and later the Linux movement gave me something to beleive and created a positive outlet for my insecurity. I can see now when all the jocks that terrorized us in Highschool are working for their dad's at the car dealership have 2 kids an ugly wife and thinning hair, I laugh as I see how much more "constructive" my high school time ended up being. The blame shouldn't be put on Doom or the Net ... the blame should be on people trying to illegitemize the things that people like myself need to thrive. mailto://karges@hotmail.com
--- ask me about nihilism, I will have nothing to tell you.
I find it amazing too how close-minded you are in highschool. The little world you are in seems to be all that is and ever will be. We're constantly told that our teen years (maybe early 20's too) are the best years of our life. There needs to be something done to address the nagging issue of teen depression. Guns and bombs or date raping or drunk driving or drug abuse or any other multitude of teenage vices all stem from deeper problems. Its those problems that need to be addressed.
--- ask me about nihilism, I will have nothing to tell you.
Nor, might I add, did trenchcoats.
And prohibition certainly didn't prevent it.
Maybe it's time to try a different tack.
(If one person inside that school, even a police officer, had been armed, this whole thing most likely would have turned out differently.)
Pretend there is some witty statement here.
If it weren't for the guns, probably more people would have died. The authorities are still finding bombs, and it's been three days.
All it would have taken would have been for the propane tank bomb to have gone off, and there would have been 30 people dead right there.
So, in this case, the guns didn't make it any easier.
And how would more gun control have made it harder for them? They were already carrying weapons illegally. The sign on the door of the school that said "No firearms allowed" sure as hell didn't stop them.
Pretend there is some witty statement here.
Wednesday morning, an 11 year old boy called in to a local morning radio show. He was talking about how easy it was for him to get drugs: he knew exactly who he needed to go to in his school in order to get drugs. The hosts asked him if it was that easy for him to get a gun, and he said that it was; he was sure he knew right who to go to in order to get a gun.
We spend $17.1 billion a year trying to keep drugs away from kids. And look at the result. What happens when we declare a War On Guns?
Prohibition didn't stop this. So what do we do?
Pretend there is some witty statement here.
The problem is guns. Only the bad guys have them. The bad guys are going to have them no matter what kind of laws you pass prohibiting them. What would happen if the good guys had guns too?
I'll tell you what would happen: the good guys would all turn bad.
You see, it's a scientifically proven fact that guns are EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEVIL. When a normal person gets ahold of a gun, he turns into a psychotic killer. The waves of evil come off of the gun and into the normal person's brain, turning him into a raving lunatic.
In fact, guns are so EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEVIL that they have been known to roam around at night when their owners are asleep and kill people by themselves!
Yes, we must ban all guns, now! For the children. If it saves only one life.....
Pretend there is some witty statement here.
You have many good points, but I must disagree on a few.
Being an outcast, being a rebel, being a loner gives no one in society the right to take lives. I admit, I'm another victim of the system. A junior in high school, I'm too clumsy to be in sports, not pretty enough to be a cheerleader, not popular enough to get a date to Prom. I spend my lunch periods on the Internet in a telnet window.
The world is always going to be filled with the big, the dumb, the ditzy, the attractive who seem to rule things in the high school scene, and the outcasts, the geeks, the punks have no choice but to fight against the framework these populars set up.
But the truth is...People ARE born to kill. People ARE born to cheat. People ARE born inherent sinners.
Without absolutes, the fiber of society literally falls to shreds.
These teenagers were among the best examples of this. They were apparently fans of Marilyn Manson, and among a group of "dark people", as news reports put it. I wouldn't be surprised if they were satanists, followers of evil itself.
And when man is put into control, a black and white right and wrong vanishes into a grey miasma of confusion.
These students blurred the line of right and wrong until it didn't exist anymore. You can say these students killed because they were outcasts. You can say they killed because they were Satanists. You can say they killed because of their upbringing. Or the media. Or technology. You can speculate, and speculate, and speculate.
But the core of the issue is this: Sin.
They were not right to take lives. Man is made in God's image. No matter how much they were wronged by other humans (have you ever heard "turn the other cheek?") to kill is to desecrate God's most prized creation: the one He made in His image.
Man is inherently sinful.
And too often, mainstream Christian orthodoxy is too busy raising money with polyester televangelists or being part of the judgemental system itself, to take the time to care for the outcast, the oppressed.
This nation has many problems, and they are not helped by those who claim to follow the God who made this nation great in the first place, yet deny Him with their lives.
I pray I make a difference.
I offer my sincerest condolences to those who have lost loved ones in the shooting, and may God be with us all.
--RawkettPenguin
Can't sleep, the clowns will eat me...
>> How easy was it for these kids to get
>> automatic weapons?
Did they have automatic weapons? Uzi's? M-16's? BAR's? or did they have SEMI-automatics? (some people call them - "self-reloading")
There is a HUGE difference between an automatic and a semi-automatic weapon. Most new semi-automatic pistols hold 6 to 8 rounds, but the maximum, by law, is 10. In reality, there isn't much capacity difference between new revolvers and new semi-autos. A good shooter can empty and reload a revolver in about the same time as a semi-auto.
Getting rid of guns in the US will be impossible. Besides that, people who want to kill will find a way to do it. Take away the guns & they'll use pipe bombs or drive through a crowd in mom's Suburban.
I grew up in an area where everybody was armed, and I was shooting by the time I was 6 and have owned a gun since I was 8. I still shoot, yet I've never aimed a gun at a person or an animal. A gun is just another tool that can be used for good or bad - just like a car, knife, hammer or 2x4.
In my opinion, is is society problem. There are other countries that are armed - Israel and Switzerland for example. If it isn't an American society problem, why aren't Israeli kids shooting each other? Why aren't Swiss kids getting dad's rifle out of the closet and shooting each other? It's an American problem, not a gun problem.
Captain Skynyrd
Earlier today, I was at a funeral for a friend.
Her name was Cassie. I met her when she walked into my youth group two years ago, where she continued to come until she was murdered last tuesday. She was a wonderful person, and I've never seen her say anything that would 'make life hell' for anyone, including verbal abuse or talking behind someone's back. She was a person you could always call on if you needed someone to talk with, and spent a lot of her spare time downtown at Victory Outreach, a ministry in Five Points that helps people fresh out of prision that want to change. But, I guess that according to you she was heartless, cold and evil.
I don't think that anyone deserved to die in this situation. Did you know any of the victims -or- the killers? If so, then you can say that they deserved to die- then that would be an valid opinion. But if you don't know them, how can you say they all deserved to die?
Still not dead.
I didn't go to my prom, but I did go to one at in a neighboring town. (*ring* "Hi Mike, what's up?" "Not much, why" ... [half an hour of small talk] "By the way, do you want to go to my prom with me?" "So THAT'S why you called! No.") I _hated_ it. Enormous waste of time and money (renting a tux ain't cheap).
It was so bad that I didn't go to the prom at my high school the subsequent year.
I don't feel as though I missed anything worthwhile.
You're a suburbanite.
So, how do you propose to keep those kids away from the guns? Sure... legislation can make it harder to buy guns through legitimate channels, but all you're doing with a law is giving the black market for weapons a shot in the arm.
Nobody knows (yet) how the kids got access to those weapons, which I'm pretty sure the media seems to be saying were illegal in the first place. If they were warped enough to build propane-tank bombs (as far as I understand, quite advanced as far as home-made bombs go)... there is NO WAY you can prevent them from killing people, if they want to kill people.
It's the awful truth. They were not living in the same reality as the rest of us, for whatever reason. They planned murder.
Now, the frenzy over whether they had accomplices... I'd hate to be one of them with this burning media spotlight shoving their arms down everyone's throat.
Well, I wouldn't be surprised if they did get the information from the library, since that was mentioned on ABC as their favorite place to hang out. Plus, while they were researching their explosives, they probably would have gotten enough info on gunpowder(a common enough explosive) to make their own guns.
I might be wrong, but my old highschool library probably isn't the only one with books like the "Joy of blacksmithing"(yes, you too can make your own semiautomatic rifle with only a few pounds of steel, a piece of railroad track, and a big hammer!) I actually built a simple shotgun once and I probably don't have half the patience they must have had to have built 20-30 some explosives.
As for how many fatalities they would have had, guns vs bombs, if the swat teams hadn't disabled most of them, I think the casualties would have been much higher. There was one in the kitchen/commons area that probably would have taken out everyone if it had gone off during lunch. Which part of the reason why no one is going to be in that building for quite awhile(not to mention they left the bodies for forensics... ewww)
Part of the problem is the news coverage, as was stated byKatz. You don't see this type of news coverage on the number of people that jump off bridges, this is because the police don't want other people, who might be suicidal, to get the idea in there head that if they do this they will achieve some recoginition.
.02
If this is so then why do they place so much press on the shootings, there sensationalizing the coveage and all the other mildly screwed up people will be gaining the idea that this could be a cool thing to do.
Just my
Fugazzi
For a hilarious take on the whole D&D/Satanism thing try the following: ht tp://www.deadalewives.com/sound/[The_Dead_Alewives ]-[Dungeons_and_Dragons].mp3
The school killings that I have heard about seem to be motivated towards certain individuals or groups. Granted, others are taken down with them but the focus remains.
The problem I forsee is an individual who is not bitter at a specific group, but everybody in general. This would encourage the use of more drastic, but less selective methods of exterminating large numbers of people. Imagine, on a smaller scale, Oklahoma City or the Tokyo subway. It some ways, it may be a good thing that the killers have restricted themselves to guns and small explosives.
The answer is (unfortunately) complex. Let me preface this by saying that I don't blame the media or the game industry - the burden is not upon them to take responsibility for the actions of their viewers.
.02.
It's obvious that there is an unprecedented assortment of tools and information to kids. Fifteen years ago, people may have been just as pissed off as they are today, but they simply didn't have the resources to execute them. How many kids knew how to make napalm before The Anarchist Cookbook hit the shelves?
Another issue is "allowability". I don't think you had kids thinking about blowing their classmates skulls off in the context of actually doing it. Again, I'm not holding media creators accountable - each person is responsible for themselves - but I'm quite sure that Natural Born Killers gave a few people some interesting ideas. Unfortunately, the emphasis is on laying blame, but laying blame isn't accurate nor even helpful.
In summation, I think that it needs to be recoginized that as our civilization grows and becomes more mature, there will be people that snap and do things like this. To treat it as an avoidable abberition is just plain silly.
My
Quux26
My
Quux26
www.crashspace.net
You also need to look at those statistics again. The juvenile population has oscillated as the WWII "baby boom" juveniles grew out of that population and then their children entered it. See if the statistics to which your refer are just totals or if they account for the varying population.
The kneejerk reaction includes gun restriction reactions. There already are laws on many weapons, and the kids had two sawed-off shotguns which probably were illegal. Laws do not stop people who break laws, laws only control people who respect laws. (And guns helped two other recent school shootings: one wrestler with gun training recognized the click of an empty gun and tackled the shooter, and a Jonesboro employee ran to his car and used his National Guard semiautomatic to help apprehend those snipers (he had to run to his car which was parked off school property because he couldn't park a car with a locked gun on the school property))
Not many references in that article. Shouldn't a Slashdot article have at least one HTML link per paragraph?
you're right, paying attention to the children is what they need, but not in the form of an untrusting search of their belongings. children are people and have rights to privacy too. i don't think that the internet or computer games or any other media are to blame for this incident. parents need to be involved in their childrens lives in a positive way, not an accusatory way.
The access that kids have to guns is generally through two channels: 1) they get them from home or, 2) they buy them on the black market. The solution to the first channel is for gun owning parents to be responsible and secure their weapons. The bigger problem, however, is the second channel, the black market.
By definition, anyone obtaining anything from a black market is breaking the law, so more laws will not eliminate the market, they will only expand its scope.
Why is there such a thriving black market for guns? It certainly didn't arise as a response to the overwhelming demand of children for guns. The black market is getting guns into the hands of children, but their demand didn't create the black market. Whose demand did feed the growth of the illegal arms trade? The criminal elements associated with the drug trade. The demands of the drug trade for weapons to protect/defend/acquire markets has led to the huge amount of guns that are available on the black market, unregulated by any gun law or legal authority. There are so many illegal guns out there that the spillover is resulting in children being able to purchase guns cheaply and easily.
My thesis is that the rise of the gun culture, and therefore the rise in gun use by children, is one of the many unintended consequences of our nation's illogical obsession with the never-ending drug war. The drug war has led to the prolific rise in the number of unregulated weapons in this country, weapons that find their way into the hands of drug dealers and high school freshmen alike. When we, as a society, come to our senses about our irrational reaction to the use of euphoriants and treat their abuse as a medical issue rather than a criminal issue, then we will see a reduction in the violent crime related to the drug trade as well as a reduction in the amount of guns that are available on the black market, a market that our children are using to arm themselves against the diffuculties of childhood.
my
BTW, I do not own a gun, I do not frequently use illegal drugs (though I've occassionally used them in the past). I say this to illustrate that I am not an NRA gun nut, and I'm not a stoner looking for a way to make my habit easier. I'm just thoroughly convinced that the drug war has extremely detrimental effects on society, and the spread of guns and violence is one of the more obvious examples. When is the cure worse than the disease?
O.K., I guess that's my
This is very well put, but don't expect Ted Koppel to raise this point on Nightline anytime soon. The media's analysis of this issue starts by pointing the finger of blame in the direction which least implicates the majority of the reading/viewing audience -- e.g., electronic games, the Anarchist Cookbook, metal bands, fringe political groups. The suggestion that the suburban way of life (which is deemed Good and Pure) might somehow give rise to this sort of behavior, while urban living (which is deemed Sleazy and Corrupt) does not, won't even show up on the radar screen. The unhappy suggestion that the shooters may have been terrorized by their classmates has for the most part also been ignored.
Along those same lines, I would note that probably the most outrageous and cynical thing I've seen in the aftermath of this shooting is the media hyping of police speculation that the shooters' friends had a role in all this. The police are openly suggesting that the shooters had accomplices in the mass murder of their classmates. While they haven't named names, that's a horrible smear on the reputation of the shooters' friends, who are probably already pretty traumatized. While I can't say for certain that the speculation is wrong, the police certainly could have kept their hypotheses to themselves until they completed the first phase of their investigations.
Are you serious?
e -i-said-so parenting.
When did children become sub-human? Last time I heard ALL humans have a right to privacy, even the little ones.
Responsible parenting is what is needed, not iron-fist-police-state-search-and-seizeure-becaus
I play doom/quake/etc. I own a trenchcoat. My parents NEVER searched me for 'contraband'. I have private files on my computer, they are still private. I was an 'outcast' throughout in school, I had TWO friends both 'outcasts'. I was mocked/ignored/etc... I am listening to marilyn manson while typing this. I have lived through almost every 'hell' possible for a 'nerd'
I have never hurt anyone. I never will.
You can't make someone a killer by showing them rated R movies. The goverment wouldn't need to give Special Forces troops Psych exams to find out if they are 'acceptable'. A training program of Doom games, violent movies, making fun of each other, and viewing offensive material on the internet would do just fine.
--
Bun-Bun Rules!
90% of day read
10% of
"there weren't any obvious reasons in the family life why this would happen"
Thats the whole thing about this; the reasons aren't normally "obvious" in any sense.
Everyone thinks things like alcoholism, abuse etc, when they try think of "obvious" things that are wrong. But some problems are far more insiduous.
I grew up in a family with no "obvious" problems. From the outside, everything looks great - upper/middle class, happily married parents, relatively wealthy, intelligent family (everyone has degrees or post-grad degrees), all achievers etc. But I know the absolute hell of growing up with no support structure whatsoever and a horrible school life - despite the fact that there is nothing obviously wrong with my family. Some problems don't show on the surface. These kids probably just had no support structure, nobody they could talk to (that was actually approachable) that would understand their problems, and nobody that seemed to care. (As another example, Sylvia Plath also seemed to have a "perfect" life on the outside.)
Millions of kids are going through the same hell each day, and nobody seems to care .. "ah, kids problems, how cute, remember when we were kids, ha ha, we didn't know what real problems were yet". It is no surprise that some kids crack. Our society is failing miserably at raising kids.
The media loves to demonize anything that is not mainstream. I read a number of articles regarding this incident the other day. It was amazing the things that were mentioned: death match in DOOM, a German industrial band called KMFDM, and the internet. So now anyone having an interest in the above three items is now associated (at least in the public's mind) with mentally disturbed killers.
So what is the solution to these schoolyard killings? Shall we place metal detectors by all of the doors? Place armed security guards there as well? Making our schools secured in this way will be similar to sentencing our high school kids to prison. How about removing web sites with ideas we do not share? Will that protect us?Taking freedom away does not make us a free society.
There is an article today on CNN's web page today entitled, "Denver Station Cancels Marilyn Manson Concert." This is as much as a guilty verdict. Why not just come out and say it? M.M. made my kids kill.
What's scaring me is at least part of what caused this was harassment of these students by other students and the media coverage isn't making it any better. All the members of the "trechcoat mafia" will have to switch schools, and goths at many schools will face increasing harassment because of it. This will lead to more kids .... specifically goths snapping. Media will cover it causing a circular problem.
I am not a goth, but some of my friends are and they have fallen under increased scrutiny.
The other thing that is scary about this is how ready people are to give up their freedom because of it. If problems of this nature continue our rights to free speech, freedom of assembly, and the right to bear arms will be restrcited to no avail. How can you stop someone who is willing to die for their cause?
"Sometimes it's hard to tell the dancer from the dance." --Corwin Of Amber in CoC
Dream well...
Curgoth
Latest news reports that the kids involved in the shooting apparently made a film for a class several months ago in which they were shown going through school killing athletes. For a class. Meaning people other than themselves obstensibly watched it. People like teachers. And, oddly enough, nobody apparently thought anything of it or perceived it as a possible warning that these kids could seriously snap and actually do such damage.
.WAD makers for DOOM as well, and claimed one level they made was "a good killing level". This of course was jumped upon by the hysterical reporters.
And the media is quick to blame video games for this? I already saw one story where it was revealed the two kids were
Granted, there's no single explanation for what happened in Colorado. However, some contributing factors would appear to weigh more than others, and I think it appropriate to rank the inattentiveness and inactivity on the parents' part and the teachers' part higher than video game violence. But I guess as the aftermath of the Arkansas shooting shows, it's much easier to sue manufacturers of video games (those game designers sure do have deep pockets) rather than take a long look at one's own faults.
I'm really really getting fed up with the sensationalistic American media. Sigh.
I don't think anyone will deny that those two kids are responsible for killing all those people, but that isn't the point here. Calls for more personal responsiblity don't mean anything because the killers killed themselves. You can't hold someone accountable if they want to die. The appropriate question is, what made them want to do it, not who is responsible for it.
No. What you need to do is respect their privacy. They deserve the same freedom from unauthroised intrusion into their affairsas you do. So you grant them that freedom. But you still keep an eye on them, and try to engage them in friendly conversation to know what's going on. If you see the kin run out the doy, and see the truck coming down the street, THEN you put on the Parent costume and start acting like one. You don't forbid the kid from going out from fear of a truck, or hand-hold them the rest of their lives. Once the kid hits a reasonable level of mental development you can expect that you can let them go outside without them running into the path of a truck. But that doesn't mean you don't stop glancing out the window every now and then. You can never be entirely certain.
And PArenting is governing. I must assume as a parent, you've imposed at least one rule on your child, even if it is simply to use the toilet instead of the carpet. Well hey, you've just participated in 'governing' (which is simply the execising of authority). The key thing to 'good' parenting is the extent to which, and manner in which a parent governs.
-- M. Slager
Gun Control helps in possibly two ways:
1) Posession of firearms is illegal for private citizens. Thus sales of firearms to private citizens is illegal. Makes it very hard for kids to get the firearms, either directly or via stealing/borrowing from older friends/parents.
OR
2) Posession of firearms within X kilometres of a populated region/city is illegal. Likewise sale of firearms to a person in such a region is illegal (the firearm can be purchased, but must be shipped out-of-city, to a gun-club etc. The gun-club must also provide proof (to authorities) that the gun is being stored there, and must prevent membership from removing it without permit (such as a hunting license to go on a hunt), and track it if they do remove it (ie: it must be checked with another club within X days))
Gun Control isn't simply restricting who can buy guns, or how quickly. Such pitiful measures will never work anyways. They key is to prevent the sale of the weapon in the first place. Guns aren't all that useful. Crime rates in regions where gun posession is prevelant are pretty much never lower than regions where it is not (which should be common sense). Thus posession of a gun really doesn't protect you. Buy a bottle of pepper spray if you must. Sure, it can be abused, but it can't for the most part kill.
-- M. Slager
...just how long it will be before all these idiotic high school kids stop picking on people who are different just because they're different because they realize that any one of their victims could at any time bring a gun to school and start blowing people's heads off in retaliation... I mean, what the hell has happened to the self-preservation instinct? The two Littleton boys apparently talked about guns, bombs, etc for a very long time -- it was one of the reasons they got picked on -- but in this day & age, picking on someone like that is almost guaranteed to get you killed. Picker picks on pickee; pickee gets pissed; pickee has one or no friends; pickee has other problems (abusive parents, etc); pickee sees nothing to live for and no hope of ever being liked; pickee exacts his vengeance with hand guns, rifles, and pipe bombs. It's almost a form of natural selection; the meanest, nastiest people, who do the most picking-on, are the ones who get hunted down and shot. Of course, innocent non-nasty people, who've never picked on anyone before, get caught in the crossfire... but sometimes, in the pickee's mind, *everyone* is guilty and deserving of death because *nobody* has ever given them the time of day, much less stood up for them during the daily picking session. The moral of all this? It's very simple. If you want to survive your educational years, don't pick on people. I go out of my way to be as nice to everyone around me as possible... not out of fear of being filled with 38-caliber holes, but out of genuine compassion and love for my fellow humans (except Bill Gates, of course.) We're all just visiting this rock, you know... 80 years with luck, or even less... the twinkling of an eye. Life is too short to waste your time trying to find new, more exciting ways of belittling those who are different and thus pushing them over the edge of insanity into feeling that blowing away all their enemies and then themselves makes a lot of sense. Of course, barring trenchcoats and offering counseling for Doom players (does anyone still play that game anymore? :) is going to do precisely squat to alleviate this problem, but somewhere out there, there's a sad, lonely, friendless someone who is nearing the breaking point. These kids could definitely benefit from counseling, but how to find out which ones need it? Making counseling mandatory for every child in America might have some effect, but it would also piss off every child in America... and there's no way in hell insurance companies would pay for it (money is always the top priority in any and all situations, you see) so it would have to be volunteers and that means you wouldn't get the best-quality counselors and the treatment as a whole would suffer and there'd be no point so why bother trying. The ones who have the greatest chance of keeping these children from activating their self-destruct sequences are, ironically, the ones CAUSING the entire problem in the first place. It's cliques of close friends who delight in the torment of others who cause all of this; and it's them and them alone who can stop it by.. well, by just stopping it. So the next time, kiddies, that you go out of your way to be mean to people just because they're black, or gay, or in the band, or really skinny, or really fat, or always wear black trenchcoats, or have an odd accent, or just look funny, remember... you could be next.
"All truth passes through three stages: first, it is ridiculed; next it is violently attacked; finally, it is held to be self-evident."
>children are people and have rights to privacy too.
I certainly do not like it when I perceive that my privacy has been violated, but is it a right? Is it even beneficial?
There is also a question in my mind as to where one draws the line between the supposed rights of children and society's desire to see these children made into contributing members of said society. I don't propose to answer that question myself. My guess is that this is much like medicine -- there is no one cure that works equally well for all people, all societies, or all families.
Dig out your US map.
Draw a line from Edinboro Pennsylvania
to Hope Arkansas.
Notice how the towns of
Jonesboro Arkansas and
Fayetteville Tennessee
fall on the line
don't know what it means. It's just
strange.
Oh, I didn't have a chance to buy the
Anarchist Cookbook till 1975.
It is not hard to see that official attention is paid to an atrocity in direct proportion to the social status of its victims, and usually, its (immediate) perpetrators. Look instead for the things you are encouraged not to hear about. Uncaring parents and teasing by classmates notwithstanding, these two kids had a lot of advantages over most. If the sickness of our society is beginning to get to them, how many more vulnerable people does it destroy? Millions, of course; but those are easier to hide from the few with power. Even to consider an incident such as this shooting somehow significant is almost insulting to the mass of people from whom wealth is systematically extracted so that you and I can surf the Web.
If you hold any of the traditional, altruistically or reciprocally based moral philosophies, it is incumbent on you to see the profound evil on which everything about current mass-capitalist society is based. Shootings in schools are an effect. The wars in Yugoslavia are an effect: the arms manufacturers have to field-test their products somehow. The media oligopoly which concentrates your attention on the previous two phenomena is an effect. The prison system which you are encouraged to forget about is an effect.
If you don't base your philosophy of life on such a moral principle (I don't), then at least recognize that the unequal distribution of wealth is thermodynamically unstable and likely to explode in all our faces sooner or later - and that the cavalier way we treat our planet benefits no one. How many of the psychological oddities of this century are attributable to low-level environmental poisoning? No one knows. Research on this topic is awfully hard to get funding for.
I've given up trying to save the world. Even knowing a little of what goes on, and a little of how thoroughly penetrated and programmed I am, a worm of cynical, elitist doubt remains, that most people aren't really worth saving anyway and will fight me if I try. I just try not to go crazy today, today, and leave not going crazy tomorrow for tomorrow. But please, look around you, and look inside yourself. Try to see the ways in which both you and your surroundings have been modified to serve the power structure. Understanding begins with the realization that anything like a shooting in a school, no matter how shattering to its victims, is irrelevant.
Constructive logic destructs my brain.
The only thing the media has done with this whole thig is confuse me. I have no idea what is truth and what is fact anymore. I have heard so many different thigs about this case that I really no longer care to hear about it. For example: Right after it first happened there were 25 dead people. The next day there were 19 dead people. Finally today I hear there are 15 dead people. Which is right? The only thing media is good for is blowing things completely out of proportion and scaring the living hell out of all the parents in the nation. I know if I was 15 again and my parents told me to stop wearing black and to stop playing Doom I would get pissed and resent them more than I did anyway. I think what parents should do now is sit down at a computer and play a nice relaxing network game of Unreal with their children. Get involved in what they are into. Help them out, encourage them to be intrested in something no matter what it is. I've got a friend that just recently turned 17 and his main hobby is throwing knives. He's really fucking good at it too. His parents encourage him in this and actually buy knives for him. They don't go throwing with him or nothin but they have tried. I think this is a great thing and more parents should be this encouraging. That's all I have to say about the media and parents.
I'm not sayin go do drugs with your children. Just notice their intrests and accept what they are into. I'd go to a MM concert with my son if he asked me to. I'd buy tickets for him to go to a MM concert with a friend if I knew he was into them.
I used to make firecrackers when I was younger. I'd empty out the powder from about 30-40 M-100's and put it all into one shell that I had emptied. Then put them in some sort of fruit and BLAMMM, No more fruit. Not even any remnants of whatever fruit it used to be. I did it all in fun and I never bought one of those M-100's and my parents knew what I was doing with them. All they ever told me was to be careful. Then complain about the craters in the back yard. I guess all I'm trying to say is you shouldn't take something away from a child if they are really into it. Let them go through the stage and get bored with it. If you take away something they really like and have fun doing it will just build the tension between parent and child. The child won't let you know how much it hurt them. They will just go out and do it behind your back and you won't have a clue. Accept their intrests and they will respect you and both of you will be better off in the long run.
Anyway, I would agree that Katz is playing fast and loose with the statistics. What are are real numbers, Jon, and let us decide if the teenage crime rate is plummeting?
I also think that TV, movies, games desensitize us to violence and glorify violence. If you watch violence or do violent games a lot, I find it hard to believe that that there is no effect. It is like an endless commercial for violence, and we know very well that (some) commercials are very effective.
There are no moral, or ethical standards being taught or used today in homes, education, business, or government.
There are people who want to reintroduce moral standards into public life. Unfortunately, they seem to think the really important moral standards are the ones governing who you have sex with, or how. Nothing to do with killing people. Tsk.
If you're speaking of Dylan, that wasn't enough. According to the Washington times (I don't have the link right now), he was in counseling for attempted auto theft! The kid drove a BMW every day!
The problem that he had is the same one that I see with my younger sisters; their parents give them everything. Unconditionally. I see it as a defense mechanism found in poor parenting, it starts when the children are very young, and most often occurs in the relationships between parents and younger siblings (note that both Dylan and Eric were the youngest in their families).
As anyone with young kids around knows from experience, children fight about posession of everything. Quite often, the older child will win the phisical fight, but the completion of this contest just spawns another of temper tantrums. When the younger siblings throw the tantrum, many parents will do ANYTHING to make it stop. Usually the fought after object is given outright to the tantrum thrower, just to end the crying. This is the dangerous part, as it sets a pattern of the parent always apeasing the youngest child, a behavior that doesn't stop with childhood. The older child, many times, learns to deal with the challenge of having what was "theirs" being taken away, thus making the older child more apt to overcoming adversity to gain the parents' attention. The younger child only gains quick appeasement in place of genuine parental attention.
Moving forward to the hormonally driven teenage years, the younger sibling may attempt to do many things to shock or disturb their parents by doing anything that may bring forth a negative response (remember the parents in this situation are used to giving the child what they want, not what they need). In many cases, it is too late, as the parent misinterprets what they think the child wants from them, making the parents try hard to please the child by "being cool." This of course doesn't work, as it would only drive the child to more outrageous things. Neither the parents, nor the mal-adjusted youth realize that what they need is a real channel of communication, not a stimulus-reaction type of relationship.
I've aluded to my own sisters above, as I know them best to demonstrate this pattern. To be truthfull, the older one is actually my twin, but the eleven minutes separating us at birth have grown into almost ten years at our current age of 25 (I'm the older one). As we grew up though, I was always the oldest one, and my youngest sister (now 23) even today is referred to by my mother as the "baby of the family."
Today, I am married. My wife and I own a house, and two new cars (although we paid for them through the American way of debt). My sisters, in contrast, live together in a house that my parents own. They each drive S-Class Mercedes that my father originally bought for himself (he walks 5 miles to and from work everyday as he doesn't have a car now). Even though both of my sisters have jobs (and college degrees), they pay no rent or utilities, and my father is the one who pays for all of the feul that both of their cars use.
I won't even go into the things that they have done in trying to shock my parents, suffice it to say that I would have been appauled if they were my kids.
I write of this pattern as I have seen it many times in my experience in counseling youth in the Boy Scouts. Also, I have seen it many times in my roomates, friends and other acquaintances that I have made both at college and elsewhere. I mean no offence if anyone reading this feels singled out, or unfairly characterized. I certainly hold no ill will towards my parents, although I think that my sisters are taking too much advantage of them.
I wrote this because I just feel that I have to get it off of my chest, hoping that someone may recognize themselves as the parent or youngest/only child, and make a concerted effort to change the situation.
-- Len
My dad called last night and left a message on my voice mail to watch keep a special eye out for the people I hang around. The guys in colorado do fit in closely with anything that would resemble my subculture. But I figure the bottom line is that these kids are forced to deal with a substandard system. They have to go to school and waste their time learning things they already know. It's frustrating, and it's not right. But for myself and my close freinds, our way of dealing with it is to fight it by getting inside and changing it, not by destroying its participants. When I need to kill a group of people, I'll go play quake. I seek refuge in being able to blow people up over the internet, and knowing that it's just a game. The realities of the school system are more horrid than anything I could ever hope to achieve, but I do my part to change it. I feel that the incident in colorado was a great loss for us. It sends the wrong message about where the problems really lie. But on the otherhand, hopefully it will wake america to the real problems.
"Black man, white man, rip the system!"
I think that many children today lack the sophistication to screen out the 'real' and 'unreal' from media and from computer games.
I don't think this "lack of sophistication" is only limited to today's children. I know just as many "adults" (probably more) that fit that statement as well.
I still remember the Rwanda slaughter, rivers flowing with blood. Instead of 13 people dead there were millions dead. Most of these murders were not at the hand of automatic rifles, but knives and sticks. I don't think we are going to remove all the trees from the world. People will continue to make weapons from rocks and sticks.
This is a moral issue, not an availability one. Taking away guns is like giving asprin to a man who just had his legs cut off. The pain will be less, but he will still bleed to death if the cause isn't dealt with. We need a return to God, morals, and decency in schools.
Anyone who cannot cope with mathematics is not fully human.
It's scary how much the media can take a screwy idea and exploit it. How many geeks remember their schools banning or threatening to ban AD&D, etc, for fear of satanism?
Then again, lots of non-media type people seem to believe that "the internet" leads to antisocial postal rampages. We had a bomb scare at my university yesterday. Supposedly a copycatter trying to tie into the Littleton exitement. Helicopters were flying around overhead all afternoon and two buildings had to be evacuated.
Major inconvenience!
Here is the part that most of my friends don't agree with but I think is very important. In the not so nice but "real world" if someone gets beat up, pushed around or basically mistreated then actions that are taken. In school this is a little bit more difficult mainly because of social stigmas and bullying. These kids are in an environment that allows, even condones their mistreatment. Their society is responsible for their hurt so when they explode, they target their revenge at the whole group, not just specific individuals. Everyone's fault, everyone pays.
I have not heard of a better explanation yet.
markmansour@yahoo.com.stopingspam
I haven't heard that these two were teased at all. Where do you get that? They were part of a group of kids that apparently didn't 'fit in.' If they reacted by killing in response to teasing and taunting, the blame is purely theirs. No one 'dished out' bullets and bombs on them. Just because someone doesn't like you and shows it doesn't give you the right to take that person's life. I can't believe people are trying to justify murder because these two weren't in the more popular group in that school! I've been on the receiving end of taunts and teasing in school. It was frustrating, and I still hold grudges against some of the people that did it (wish I could grow up when it comes to that), but I don't think that in any way gives me the right or the predisposition to respond with violence, or even with teasing and taunts.
-just bein'
first of all that is hardly true ... it is true that the media does cover middle class white male shootings ... but there is a reason for that ... i went to a school of mostly black kids (i'm a middle class white female 21 yrs old) ... there where shootings and stabings at my school at least 3 times a year ... and even the local media didn't cover it ... no reason to ... it wasn't news ... it was buisness as usual ... but one 3 middle class white teenagers where killed in a yogurt shop one christmas i had to listen to songs about it every freaking christmas for 7 years ... yes 7 !!! ... i knew people who were killed at my school that were barely even in the obituary ... it's not news ... it's the norm ... it's something that is not shocking and can't be changed ... so it doesn't even get headlines when someone is shot execution style, on their knees, naked in the boys bathroom at my school ... it's not that middle class white males go crazy ... it's that media decides to cover it ...
... and my dad is a vegitarian, bike riding, no car having, hippie who reads gahndi ... he says he plays doom because it releases his need to hunt and kill w/out any real harm to others (except maybe his wife who is tired of him playing on the computer)
oh yeah
so bite me
starr
---
if knowledge is power, the internet is god - me again
saying absolutes like that minimize the situation ... maybe 20 years ago that would have helped ... but once the wound is open saying that it shouldn't have ever but opened doesn't stop the bleeding ... it will take more than laws to help this society now ... much much more
if knowledge is power, the internet is god - me again
Think how different the situation at Littleton, CO would have been with a couple of well trained gun owners incapacitating the killers.
:-)
There was. The campus security guard exchanged fire with the gunmen, then went for back-up. He missed.
Think how different the situation in Littleton, CO would be without this
Amendment II
A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
Before you flame read on. I think the framers of the Constitution simply couldn't comprehend what some laws might come to mean in the future. I would seriously doubt they would have advocated regular citizens owning enough firepower to blow up a school. Remember what a gun meant in those days, a musket, with a reloading time of what, a minute or two? Contrast that with what we have today and there is a change in weaponry power of such a magnitude that no ruler in his right mind would allow a normal citizen to own it, much less have a guaranteed right to own it.
While I don't agree with freaking out over such a situation (or any of the associated "Symptoms" of this behavior, many of which I share) I do believe that some work needs to be done on the documents that created and defined this country (US) that allow such events (and possibly much worse ones) to occur. The word privacy is not in our Constitution, yet we are protected from being forced to house soldiers (which I'm sure was a hot topic at the time). I think now (millenium and all that) might be a good time to do a bit of house cleaning and remove much of the cruft that hampers our country's source code.
Sorry just went off a bit there, but hey, you can't stop me,
+&x
Think how different the situation at Littleton, CO would have been with a couple of well trained gun owners incapacitating the killers.
There was. The campus security guard exchanged fire with the gunmen, then went for back-up. He missed.
Think how different the situation in Littleton, CO would be without this
Amendment II
A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
Before you flame read on. I think the framers of the Constitution simply couldn't comprehend what some laws might come to mean in the future. I would seriously doubt they would have advocated regular citizens owning enough firepower to blow up a school. Remember what a gun meant in those days, a musket, with a reloading time of what, a minute or two? Contrast that with what we have today and there is a change in weaponry power of such a magnitude that no ruler in his right mind would allow a normal citizen to own it, much less have a guaranteed right to own it.
While I don't agree with freaking out over such a situation (or any of the associated "Symptoms" of this behavior, many of which I share) I do believe that some work needs to be done on the documents that created and defined this country (US) that allow such events (and possibly much worse ones) to occur. The word privacy is not in our Constitution, yet we are protected from being forced to house soldiers (which I'm sure was a hot topic at the time). I think now (millenium and all that) might be a good time to do a bit of house cleaning and remove much of the cruft that hampers our country's source code.
+&x
Thanks for the reply, it exposes an angle(s) that I wasn't aware of. Perhaps being close to the center of the storm has swayed my views. I still think we (US) need to ammend the Constitution as regards to privacy (a point no reply touched on), which I used as an example of something the founding fathers could not foresee and tried to transfer this to an issue they addressed (the right to own massively-lethal fire power). Anyway, thanks for the well-informed and presented reply, it's a big part of why I love /.
+&x
And yes ppl in the country read /. too! Fields on all sides, nearest town 2 miles away and only 300 people there. All I need is roof, a couple computers and a phone line.
The US was founded on very different principles than the UK. Although the liberty that the US has guaranteed to its citizens causes the potential for certain problems, it has also created an atmosphere where (for the most part), the government lets people (and society) flourish.
Take a look at the US Declaration of Independence, US Constitution, and the Bill of Rights some time.
The only excuse the government has for "firing on us" is if we break the very law that we ourselves have enacted. Our right to bear arms is one tool that we have at our disposal to make sure that this remains true.
I live in a fairly well-to-do part of town and it seems like so many parents here are more interested in having that client dinner, working over to finish that project so they can get the bonus, etc. than in spending some time with their kids.
I am so tired of the "raising children is hard today" lines. It has always been hard. It will probably always be hard. If you are going to choose to be a parent, realize that weakness is NOT AN OPTION. You have no choice but to suck it up and do it right. The alternative can be what we're seeing in Littleton.
Your comments raised my opinion of today's parents by several points. Thank you.
Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.
*bang* Whoops, I guess not anymore. :P
/* I know, I know. That was real dark. Sorry. */
Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.
Not being one to expect to see CNN promoting gun ownership I was surprised by a report several months (a year?) ago about Florida enacting a law which basically gave any citizen in good standing the right to a concealed-carry permit. Even though some groups said it would end up being the wild west in Florida, over the years, the violent crime rate went down enough that nobody could find any other reason than that more citizens were carrying guns. Then other states began to enact the same kind of laws with the same effect.
It all seemed kind of odd to me until I thought about it for awhile. If I were a criminal and I could be assured that people didn't have a way to defend themselves it would make me much happier. If I couldn't be sure if they had guns on them I might turn to burglary or some other form of theft.
It always did seem to me that more restrictive gun laws didn't seem to be working, but I also wasn't sure if the changing face of our (American) society might be what the problem really was.
Anyway, it's food for thought. No matter how much someone may hate guns I think it's pretty much a fact of life for people in the U.S.A. Even if all guns were banned how long would it take for it all to trickle out of the system? 20 years? 100 years? I certainly wouldn't want to pay the cost of housing every person caught with a gun in prison. Can you imagine what that would be like?
I don't know the answer, but it almost looks as absurd at "guns for everyone" or "guns for no one"
Jack
Now compare the murder rate Seattle to a similar town in Switzerland where most houses contain fully automatic assault rifles and the like. Seattle's murder rate is going to be much, much higher.
[snip]
WAIT A MINUTE!
I'm a swiss citizen and have completed my military service, which means that - yes - I have an automatic assault rifle in my house. BUT... Not everybody has an assault rifle in Switzerland, only those who have fullfilled their military service and been rated as "capable of carrying a gun" get one. In addition to this the ammo you get is enclosed and sealed and you are only allowed to open it in war situation (not complying is heavily punished by law). Also, we have to train using the gun every year. This does not mean going into the next forest and just shooting, but also safe manipulation etc.
Except for that, gun laws are very strict (as in the rest of Europe).
But even in this situation, we have had some ugly incidents of some weirdos using their army weapon to kill (often racist crimes). This would not have happened if those guns hadn't been in their possession.
A previous poster said that guns should be heavily regulated because they serve no other purpose than killing. I agree with that fully. Some people may be using firearms for sports, but the primary goal of firing a gun is still killing. We don't need to be able to kill (and if I remember correctly, the law even prohibits it in most countries ;). So why should a normal person be allowed to carry a gun?
I strongly believe that trying to be clever is detrimental to your health. -- Linus Torvalds
I strongly believe in the right to bear arms because I strongly want the violence turned down.
The genie has been out of the bottle since before the US was the US. There will be guns in this country, no matter what laws are passed. If we could remove all guns from this country, I'd love to. But we can't.
No matter what the law says, people who really want guns and are willing to commit murder will get them. They will get smuggled in like drugs. They will still be carried by police officers and soldiers. Given how many cops and soldiers exist, there will be enough of them on the take to provide a black market (they're just as human as we are).
Where do kids get guns for the massacres of late? In most cases, illegally. What will they do if guns are illegal? They'll get them illegally. Or they'll start leaks in the gas pipes and wait for a teacher to light a cigarette. Or they'll mix the contents of the chemistry lab with the day's lunch.
As long as criminals are going to have guns, it's very important for the honest citizens to have them as well. It's a lot harder for a criminal to pull a gun out on an unarmed victim when many potential victims are armed. Sane violent criminals (hitmen, muggers, etc.) thrive in an environment where a .44 makes them the most powerful person around. They don't do so well when every twentieth mugging victim has their own .44.
judging by american politics, the argument of americas politicians being stable and focused is crap. they are focused on only one thing and thats more power. they could care less about anything else.
I agree. Again, when you ban guns, there will be three types of people who carry them. They are criminals, soldiers, and police. In other words, the majority of the guns will be controlled by the politicians.
Do you want to live someplace where the only people with weapons are those you don't trust?
--The basis of all love is respect
I agree. I believe in the right to bear arms. Nothing more. There is no constitutional right to fire arms. Gun control, to me, means controling how one uses a gun.
Make it legal for everybody and their pet billygoat to own and carry a firearm. Make it illegal to fire one outside of a controlled firing range (there is no constitutional right to hunt, but the right to bear arms means little if there is no legal way to become skilled at using it). Make it illegal to conceal a firearm; if you're going to have a .22, holster it visibly, don't hide it under your jacket or in your purse. Make it illegal to store a weapon irresponsibly (and get specific here--safeties, locked cases, ammo stored seperate, trigger locks).
As far as being responsible for crimes committed with your weapon, I have seen similar laws for cars. In Massachusetts (at least, maybe many or all states), you are responsible for damage caused by your car by a thief if you leave the keys in it. If you leave a weapon like a Chevy around carelessly, you are responsible for the damage.
In the same way, make gun owners responsible for crimes committed with their weapons if the owner failed to responsibly secure it. If you took reasonable precautions and somebody got your weapon anyhow (picked the lock on the gun safe, for example), the owner should be exonerated. If the gun was easy pickings, you are charged with felonious firearm negligence.
--The basis of all love is respect
You wrote:
---
King George has been dead a long, long, long time, dude. Americans no longer have British soldiers knocking on their doors.
---
Quite right, but now we have the BATF, FBI, DEA,IRS, etc. armed with fully automatic weapons and in many documented cases over the past several years, engaged in wanton killing of innocent people. (Ruby Ridge comes to mind - blowing a woman's head off while both her arms are engaged holding her baby and she makes no hostile motion is indefensible under any circumstances. This was government murder, pure and simple.) When the IRS starts to send in stormtroopers, something is wrong. The founders of this country fought a War for Independence (NOT a revolution) over far less opression than our current govenment imposes.
The intent of the Second amendment was expressly to allow citizens to protect themselves from government *in the event that it no longer honored the law itself*:
"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms. The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government"
-- Thomas Jefferson, 1 Thomas Jefferson Papers, 334
"The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at." - Roblimo's last
The real problem is that we live in a world in which people are told that they have no value, nothing matters, there is no objective truth, and when you die, that's it. If that's your worldview (and it's the one pumped into modern Americans in their public schools, culture, movies, TV, magazines, music, colleges, and everything else), then there's little reason *not* to act out on whatever fantasies of revenge one may harbor. At the risk of raising the dreaded word Christianity on /., I'd like to point out that the Judeo-Christian worldview, on the other hand, teaches that there is more to existence than that, and that we are all to be held accountable for what we do. This produces a very different kind of behaviour than what we saw this week in Littleton. Even the possiblity that Hell is real and the consequences of actions can be eternal serve to substantially moderate the actions of an individual.
On this issue of firearms being valid as deterrents, I am aware of at least two members of my family in this century who have avoided assault or worse by having access to a firearm. And no, thankfully, neither of them ever had to shoot anyone - the simple presence of the weapon was sufficient to deter the crime. (This includes my cousin avoiding what could likely have been rape and death as a man who jumped into her car and started to grab her suddenly declared, "Sorry, wrong car, lady" when she drew a pistol from under the seat. She's a WWII widow, and has travelled extensively alone, but prepared, for years.) Further limits on gun "access" will only serve to further concentrate firearms in the hands of untrustworthy criminals and a possibly more untrustworthy government. Think about that seriously before you hand over your freedoms.I am constantly amazed at how many people in this forum will fight valiantly to defend free speech, privacy, and even independence from commercial interests, but senselessly support using force (and laws *are* force) to remove one of the only truly valid protections we have against tyranny. The "tyranny of Microsoft" which is railed against so much in this forum, is nothing compared to the real thing.
Please read these before you determine that government should regulate the purchase and ownership of firearms - and remember that your actions and decisions have serious consequences now and in the future.
"The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at." - Roblimo's last
Guns are not difficult to make. Ammo, however, is quite another matter - ever tried making your own brass? This is why regulation of either is reason to be gravely concerned. Do you people really want to live in a police state? After all, that *is* what they call it when the police have all the guns...
"The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at." - Roblimo's last
"The bearing of arms is the essential medium through which the individual asserts both his social power and his participation in politics as a responsible moral being..."
... and include all men capable of bearing arms."
-- J.G.A. Pocock, describing the beliefs of the founders of the U.S.
The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered as the palladium of the liberties of a republic; since it offers a strong moral check against
usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers; and will generally, even if these are successful in the first instance, enable the people to resist and triumph over them."
-- Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story of the John Marshall Court
"A militia, when properly formed, are in fact the people themselves
-- Senator Richard Henry Lee, 1788, on "militia" in the 2nd Amendment
Such are a well regulated militia, composed of the freeholders, citizen and husbandman, who take up arms to preserve their property, as individuals, and their rights
as freemen.
-- "M.T. Cicero", in a newspaper letter of 1788 touching the "militia"
referred to in the Second Amendment to the Constitution.
That the said Constitution shall never be construed to authorize Congress to infringe the just liberty of the press or the rights of conscience; or to prevent the people
of the United states who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms...
-- Samuel Adams, in "Phila. Independent Gazetteer", August 20, 1789
In the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of a 'shotgun having a barrel of less than eighteen inches in length' at this time has some
reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, we cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear
such an instrument. [...] The Militia comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense.
-- Majority Supreme Court opinion in "U.S. vs. Miller" (1939)
The conclusion is thus inescapable that the history, concept, and wording of the second amendment to the Constitution of the United States, as well as its
interpretation by every major commentator and court in the first half-century after its ratification, indicates that what is protected is an individual right of a private
citizen to own and carry firearms in a peaceful manner.
-- Report of the Subcommittee On The Constitution of the Committee On
The Judiciary, United States Senate, 97th Congress, second session
(February, 1982), SuDoc# Y4.J 89/2: Ar 5/5
In recent years it has been suggested that the Second Amendment protects the "collective" right of states to maintain militias, while it does not protect the right of "the
people" to keep and bear arms. If anyone entertained this notion in the period during which the Constitution and the Bill of Rights were debated and ratified, it
remains one of the most closely guarded secrets of the eighteenth century, for no known writing surviving from the period between 1787 and 1791 states such a
thesis.
-- Stephen P. Halbrook, "That Every Man Be Armed", 1984
"The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at." - Roblimo's last
I won't comment on everything you said, but just the last bit. I was one of those picked on & put down everyday & didn't kill any (no matter how tempted I was). I've been out of high school for 3 years now & I'm in colelge.
Now for my short comment on the last paragraph. I actually have seen a couple of the 'jocks' from my HS & one is a college football star. Lets just say the others I saw weren't having any obvious problems either (especially that one with the 98' firebird & the blonde godess on his arm, but I degress). Now for the flip side, I still can't get a date because those college girls you mention wouldn't go to someone who wasn't up to their standards anymore than highschool, in some cases worse because they have a much wider choice. I still make crappy money working with people who don't knwo their ass from a computer, but 'look good' so they were hired to speak (& whatever I tell them cause they couldn't answer themselves in a million years).
On the good side I might have a chance to setup a network for law firm & head it up after it's finished using almost unlimited funds, but like everything else has been in my life it's a constant uphill struggle that has made me more than once wished I'd had a few breaks like those preppy gq types I work with.
but enough ranting, I'll shut up now...
Don't know about .com because it has a diffrent person who has registered it. But from the whois database:
Registrant:Kronix Beepers (TRENCHCOATMAFIA2-DOM) po box 909 norton, MA 02766
US Domain Name: TRENCHCOATMAFIA.NET Administrative Contact:
Troche, Jose domain name for sale (JDT92) kronixbeep@AOL.COM
508-822-2815 (FAX) 508-977-0080 Billing Contact:
Troche, Jose domain name for sale (JDT92) kronixbeep@AOL.COM
508-822-2815 (FAX) 508-977-0080 Record last updated on 20-Apr-99.
Record created on 20-Apr-99.
Database last updated on 22-Apr-99 11:06:22 EDT.
Sounds cool doesnt it? Pretty much like "If nukes are outlawed only outlaws will have nukes!". I want one too.
The point being this: With a lot of guns in circulation most criminals will have one. With less guns in circulation less criminals will have one.
The criminal wont have to take the weapon away from the person, he'll already have his own (stolen, bought, whatever). And do you really think he'll play fair? Are you going to go for your gun when you're staring down the barrel of his gun? The cards in this game are stacked solidly against the honest upstanding citizens who'll usually have the disadvantage of being surprised, having ethical considerations, lack of routine in shooting people, might actually care what happens, getting a case of nerves, etc.
Me, I'd rather face a mugger with a knife. I can usually outrun a stoned mugger with a knife, but it's a lot harder to outrun a bullet.
Where do you think those illegal weapons come from? Built in the outlaws gun factory? Beamed here by aliens?
Illegal weapons are simply legal weapons illegaly sold, stolen, etc. And as long as guns are legal, you wont stop feeding the illegal market with new weapons.
But of course, it'll probably take 50 years until you've cleaned out most of the illegal market. Maybe shorter time if you seriously attempt to reduce the number of weapons in circulation. But they wont vanish overnight.
I couldn't have said it any better.
I think you've got that wrong. If you look at the statistics, you'll see that the more legal guns in an area = less crime. At the same time, the more illigal guns in an area = more crime.
In england, you've gotten rid of all of the guns (Less illigal guns = less crime), but here in America, you can't just get rid them. No matter how hard you try, there'll be thousands, or even millions, of illigal guns floating around ready to kill defenseless citizens.
The way we're working on the problem now (getting rid of illigal guns and stopping criminals from using them while giving good citizens concealed weapons licenses etc.) actually works wonders.
Then there's the constitution. We can't just write out part of the constitution in a crime provention experiment. The right to bear arms is a guaranteed right to defend against each other and most importantly our own government.
Children do not have a "right" to privacy, especially when it comes to computers. With all of the posts that say parents should take responsibility for what their kids do, you can't allow "private" files on a computer, esp. one that has net access._ _______________
________________________________________
Can We trust the future - Flesh99
I dont think this has so much to do with allowing private files as teaching your children the diffrence between right and wrong. My mother raised me well. She has never had a reason to look through any personal files that i may have stored on our family computer. And i will never give her a reason to.
I was taught at a young age the consequences for my actions. I was exposed to many things at a young age that other children would never have been exposed to. My mother made sure to teach me thigs at a young age. I got the talk about drugs when i was six. I had sex explained to me when i was ten. But my mother didnt just tell me what somthing was and then give the perverbial "Dont you dare ever do anything like that." Instead she explained her view points, why she felt a specific way and such. In the long run this has made me more like my mother then most kids. What i believe is my choice, it agrees with my mother becase she gave me the option to choose.
My mother was also very clear on rules. I was never allowed to fight with my sibillings. Disagreement was OK, but we had to sit down and discuss things, not see who could yell loudest. My mother made a point of my knowing that I would not be allowed to date untill I was 16. She held all of us to that rule. I knew it by heart when i was four.
I know ive rambeled a bit but my point is this, Children have a right to privacy. But not complete and total. Parents need to be involved. If i ever gave my mother a reason to look through my stuff I would feel it was more my fault then hers. The same would go if she gave me a curfew. I do not have one currently, but disrespecting my mothers wish to know where her 16 year old daughter is at 2:00 Am would definatly cause that priviledge to be taken away. I am fully aware of the house hold rules and know what needs to be done to retain my rights. How many other kids can say that? I honestly feel that the number is smaller then I would feel comfortable with.
Treat your kids with respect and they will treat you, and other members of society, with respect. Tells us where our boundaries are before we start making mistakes. At least then the fence is far away. When we get to close to the edge, the sudden appearence a fence is more of an insult then a comfort.
Feel free to email me your response.
Lissell (where have all the cowboys gone?)
It has been very usefull in high school as well. Any time a guy asked me out i told him that he would have to wait untill I was 16. There was one in particular that i was very close with emotionally. It really helped our relationship. I knew he appreciated and loved me because he was willing to wait, And i wasnt making him wait. He could have gone after any other girl he wanted to. But he didnt. And my mother has never interfeared. Who I date is my decision.
Another way that i personally have benefited from this rule is in the number of male friends i have. I tend to go for geeks. Im surrounded by them constantly (Go to a gook school, work in a geek job..) Having this rule in place told them I was off limits, so the romantic aspect never entered the equation. This way i have been friends with every guy I have dated before I dated him.
I know this doesnt work with all kids, my sister didnt follow the rule and got burned pretty badly. I think it is one of the reasons I never broke it. It was harder for my sister to tell my mom what had happened then it was to deal with what had happened. Because of what happened to my sister my mom never got mad at her, It wouldnt have helped. But it was a great example to me.
I hope im not standing on soap boxes. The heights make me hard to understand.
Lissell (where have all the cowboys gone?)
I was doing some thinking after the incident, and i realised that even though what they did was horrible i feel more contempt, not for the kids doing the killing, but for the other students. Chris Rock said something revelant to this, it was "He [OJ Simpson] shouldn't have killed her [Nicole Brown], but I understand".
The really sad part is that these kids got picked-on so much that the only way to get enough attention was to go and blow away 15 other kids. I guess if you can't get accepted by the general public, to go and kill them. I don't think, to these kids, putting down a human who treats you extremely badly is any different to them than killing rats, or ants.
I am a Theater techie. I don't make the plays u see, I make plays you see... better
Becuause it does not spread paranoia. The media is like a circus. More and more often people don't have the time or the inclination to follow current events, so the media resorts to reporting things designed to frighten and shock becuase more people will tend to pay attention. Those guys didn't do what they did because of quake or the internet or the music they listen to. There was something at work within their own minds that led them to it. But that fact doesn't sell newspapers..
Muslim community leaders warn of backlash from tomorrow morning's terrorist attack.
It's easy to take guns away from the people you don't have to worry about misusing them. Make them illegal, they'll turn theirs in. But the criminals and psychopaths will not. Instead they will be the only ones with guns. Making drugs illegal has not done much to keep them out of anyone's hands. The only people who don't have drugs are those who don't do them. Timothy McVeigh killed over a hundred people and he didn't use even one bullet. Guns are best defense against the criminal element because they are a deterrant. If a crim thinks that you might have a gun, he will think twice about breaking into your house. Here in Arizona we have a concealed carry law. After it went into effect the violent crime rate went down. The same thing happened in Florida after they enacted their concealed carry law. There will always be those who misuse guns, and people will die because of it. But this is unavoidable as long as guns exist because you cannot keep them out of the hands of the wrong people. It's better that honest good people have the ability to protect themselves. Just look at Washington DC, where guns are basically illegal. It's one of the most violent places in the country and at one point was being called the "murder capital." If taking guns away led to a decrease in violent crime, DC should be the safest place in the country. Of course the news media will not print a story based on this, instead they try to blame guns for the crime in DC, the same way that the media in Florida tried to blame guns for the increase of crime against foreign tourists. The criminals there knew that the local residents were a risky target, so they went after foreigners who they knew were not packing. It was the absence of a gun, not its presence that led to that. Baseball caps with "NRA" on the front are big sellers in airline terminals down there. Guns are a source of violence and death. But it is not possible to un-invent the gun, and it is not possible to remove them from the hands of those who should not have them. Therfore the best solution it to make sure that every honest law abiding adult has the right to own one as well, evening the odds and protecting thier homes, their families, and themselves.
Muslim community leaders warn of backlash from tomorrow morning's terrorist attack.
There are certain assumptions made, however, when one is dealing with white males. Alumni? My parents had a high school education. Family business? My father drives a semi for a living. My mother was a HoJo's waitress for years. Golfing buddy? Regularly working 80-hour weeks left my father with little time for leisurely activities at all, let alone an entire day set aside for golfing.
Pull your head out of the sand. Not every black or Latino is poor and uneducated; nor is every white male affluent or handed opportunity on a silver platter.
Somebody get that guy an ambulance!
If you want to get the attention of a community, you pick off a few people silenty.
If you want to get the attention of a nation, you pick off a few more.
Do the actions of these individuals not seem calculated to draw national media attention? I mean this not in the sensationalized let's-hijack-a-radio-station-and-deliver-our-mess
Consider this.
These two teens were driven to suicidal measures by those around them. Being dragged kicking and screaming to the conclusion that they themselves were worth next to nothing, they, by some form of logical extension, devalued the lives of those ridiculing them.
Not willing to continue such a pained existance, these two individuals became set upon suicide.
However, these kids were intelligent enough to realize that others may also be driven to suicide through similar situations.
Let's examine a few conclusions possibly reached by these individuals:
Our lives are not worth continued pain.
The lives of our tormentors are not worth much, either.
This situation was preventable.
Others may be in our situation.
Their situations may be rectifiable, or at least able to be reduced in severity.
I disagree with such suggestions that the logic of those who commit such acts is disjointed.Taken these views, does it not seem possible that perhaps, just maybe, the extra bombs and killings were calculated to draw media coverage? Coverage that would send a "don't-f*ck with us geeks" to jocks across the nation?
I believe that this event was as much, or more, a warning to the nation as it was a base attempt for revenge.
Consider the Unabomber. There was a certain profound logic to such acts. That is to say not that the acts were to be condoned, but that Mr. Kaczynski simply placed a higher value upon non-industrialism, and less value upon human lives, than is considered within the social norm. Likewise, these teens placed more importance upon the comfort of those who might be aided by their actions, and less value upon mere existance itself.
To paraphrase, a life is only worth living if it is worth living - that those who prevent those around them from living life to their potential are not worth the time and effort involved in dealing with such individuals.
The connection may not be extremely obvious, but this almost suggests that those who can contribute the most to society are those most worth keeping around.
Sound close to Nazism? Think about it.
Sorry about the unclear parts, I regrettably don't have enough time right now to organize this post as well as I'd like. At any rate, some of you will call me a psycho, and others may agree with me somewhat. It all depends on how far you've been pushed by life, and how you viewed yourself at the time.
Somebody get that guy an ambulance!
Unfortunatly, that assumes that the media is not trying for the maximum sensationalisation of the incident, but rather for accurate reporting. In the real world that is the press, the San Francisco Chronicle was the first (I think), to rehash all the 'Role playing games are evil' junk, and was closely followed by the Times (in the UK). All written in a manner to imply blame on RPG's, but never actually saying any facts, just good old FUD.
The upshot of this is that a number of roleplaying game societies have been put on hold, by 'concerned citizens'. It's nice to live in a free country. Maybe one day I will.
DarkMan sdjp@st-andrews.ac.ukSure, but take it to the other extreme; what if the other kids had been armed, and the two killers had to walk into school knowing that they were facing an honest-to-goodness firefight? Would they still have done it, or would they just have been better prepared?
Just playing Devil's advocate here, but it's an interesting thought.
"Who is more foolish, the fool, or the fool who follows him?" -- Obi-Wan Kenobi
Very, very good point. I still think parenting has a lot to do with how you grow up, but Americans have got to be the worst culture in the world when it comes to taking responsiblity for their own actions....
"Who is more foolish, the fool, or the fool who follows him?" -- Obi-Wan Kenobi
XXXXX DRUDGE REPORT XXXXX 04/21/99 22:51:05 UTC XXXXX
PAPERS: TRENCHCOAT BOYS WOULD HOLD HANDS IN HALLS; JOCKS FOUGHT, TEASED, CALLED THEM 'GAY' AND 'HOMOS'
Jocks at Columbine High would pick on the school's Trenchcoat Mafia, calling members "gay", "freaks" and "homos", the PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER and Grand Junction's DAILY SENTINEL are reporting in Thursday editions.
"They were ones you'd make fun of," Mike Smith, 18, a senior and a point guard on the school's state championship basketball team, tells the INQUIRER.
Smith says that "he and the other jocks would pick on the mafia members, egging them on with gibes of 'gay,' or 'inbreed.'"
The tensions between the jocks and the trenchcoats came to a head at the end of the last school year.
For several weeks, Smith tells the paper, the two groups fought almost daily after school.
"It was like, 'OK, we'll meet you here and we'll meet you there and get it all over with.'"
He said school officials knew about the fights but did little to stop them.
At the time in the past, he had shrugged off the disputes.
But Wednesday, he felt guilty, reports the paper's Richard Jones and Gwen Florio in Littleton.
"Sometimes," he added, gesturing at the school over his shoulder, "I think it's because of me."
Jon Vandermark, a 16-year-old sophomore, tells Thursday's DAILY SENTINEL [in Grand Junction, Colo.] that members of the Trenchcoat Mafia said they were bi-sexual.
"Boys would hold hands in the halls sometimes," Vandermark tells the paper.
"They were called freaks, homos and everything in-between."
Junior Nicole Shieve watched as the two, and others in the group, kept getting picked on during school.
"Who is more foolish, the fool, or the fool who follows him?" -- Obi-Wan Kenobi
I'd say the parental ignorance of the arms buildup is the biggest factor in my case for parental negligence. If the father was working from home, then the parents are even more to blame (not entirely, as you say, but they bear most of it). The kids built over 30 explosive devices of various sizes and stockpiled semiautomatic weapons.....was dad completely oblivious?
"Who is more foolish, the fool, or the fool who follows him?" -- Obi-Wan Kenobi
Misifts are not inherently violent, but misfits with bad parents can be. Where have the parents been during this whole mess? I have heard
all about how Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold played violent games and watched violent movies, how they were outcasts, how they wore black clothes and trenchcoats--thank goodness they didn't play Dungeons and Dragons, or we'd have to sit through that old song and dance again--but I haven't heard a single thing about their home lives or their families.
Sure, John Katz can say that these kids were "generally well-parented" but I think the empirical evidence shows otherwise. Unfortunately, I don't think Eric and Dylan are going to be volunteering information about their upbringing anytime soon.
So, the news never said: are their parents divorced, or still together? Did their mothers and fathers love them? If so, how did they show it? Surely any concerned parent would notice their child storming around in black boots and a trenchcoat, talking about Hitler and playing violent video games all the time, and regardless of what anyone says, it's kind of hard to overlook a bomb-building operation in a kid's bedroom. Did their parents take any action, or just call it a phase that they were going through and ignore them?
When I was growing up, I wore a lot of black, I studied explosives and bomb-making, I learned how to shoot, and I memorized complete copies of _Jane's Infantry Weapons_ and various army and special forces survival manuals. It was a funky hobby that never really went anywhere. I've worn a black trenchcoat almost every day for ten years, I've played DOOM-like games since they first appeared, and I'm a big fan of John Woo films. To the best of my knowledge, I never went nuts and killed anyone.
I also graduated at the top of my high school class and graduated with honors from an ivy-league college, and I'm now happily married and managing the support team for a successful tech startup. I give credit for all of my success to my parents, who took an active interest in what I was doing and why, without trying to control my life.
So what if you play QUAKE a lot and you know how to turn Mr. Clean and Clorox into mustard gas? You shouldn't be asking where these kids found out how to do all of this stuff, or what violent acts sparked their imaginations. You should be asking what motivated them to use their knowledge, and where their parents were when they were planning and preparing.
Banning trenchcoats and restricting access to "dangerous" knowledge isn't going to solve the problem. Forcing parents to wake up, smell the gunsmoke, and start RAISING THEIR CHILDREN is going to solve the problem.
"Who is more foolish, the fool, or the fool who follows him?" -- Obi-Wan Kenobi
If there is one thing I would like to say to all potential mass-murderers out there who are in the final planning stages of their rampage, it is this:
Get good publicity photos made before you kill.
I am outraged at the poor quality of photos of the deceased and deranged murderers who perpetrate media-rich acts of wanton violence: mostly they are grainy, bad black-and-white scans of some Freshman Yearbook photo.
Hey, if I thought the photo that was going to immortalize me in the minds of millions on the evening news would be one of me, pimply, awkward, and forced to smile in braces, I would seriously consider going on a killing rampage myself.
bild, www.categoryweb.com
"Where is the need for the civilian to have semi-automatic weapons in the first place?"
If you're going to advocate banning something ("semi-automatic weapons wouldn't be produced" implies banning, not "control"), you should learn what it is first. "Semi-automatic" does not mean machine gun; it simply means that the gun fires one bullet each time you pull the trigger. It's easier on the hands, and some people find their aim is better because they don't have to fool around with cocking the hammer. In terms of how fast you can shoot people if you're on an insane rampage, there's no practical difference between a semi-auto and a revolver. The media just likes to say "semi-automatic weapons" in that tone of horrified shock because they think it sounds cool.
So, either you're sadly misinformed, or you really think *all* guns should be banned. Maybe you should take a gun-safety course to get your facts straight before you take aim at other people's constitutional rights.
I don't think you'll find an example of school children shooting each other in the UK. When people are sick in the head here, they normally get a knife.
The last incident in the UK was the notorious Dunblane (I think that's how it is spelt, apologies if it is wrong) massacre, where it was a grown man doing the killing.
--
James Thorniley
p.s. dont take the sig file the worng way
I don't think you'll find an example of school children shooting each other in the UK. When people are sick in the head here, they normally get a knife.
The last incident in the UK was the notorious Dunblane (I think that's how it is spelt, apologies if it is wrong) massacre, where it was a grown man doing the killing.
--
James Thorniley
p.s. dont take the sig file the wrong way
I don't think privacy is a right. As a child, I didn't buy any of the things I used.
I have the fouth ammendment here, and I don't see anything that says that the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasnoable searches and seisures is dependant on their buying habbits, and to the best of my knowledge children are people.
My parents have as much right to look on a computer in their house as I do now in my own now that I am living on my own.
I own my computer, but I don't own my house. Does that mean my landlord can browse through my machine's files? When you go to a friends house, do they have a right to strip search you?
There may be good reasons to permit a certain amount of privacy to children
The reasons are the same as for anyone else. If a child has no right to privacy, neither do you.
I'm not trying to say that a parent would never have any good reason to go through a kid's stuff, but there should be reasonable grounds for it, just as with a police search.
And if not with a gun, then what?
Tasers. Self-defense for the geek of the new millenium.
- "[The] governor [is] constitutionally the commander of the militia of the State, that is to say, of
- every man in it able to bear arms."
- --Thomas Jefferson to A. L. C. Destutt de Tracy, 1811.
- --Thomas Jefferson to James Monroe, 1813. ME 13:261
So am I a part of a well-regulated (ie, well-trained) militia? Yes."We must train and classify the whole of our male citizens, and make military instruction a regular part of collegiate education. We can never be safe till this is done."
I am just upset that today's America is so out of touch with its history that there are people who wish to remove the right to "keep (ie, own) and bear (ie, carry) arms".
99 little bugs in the code, 99 bugs in the code,
fix one bug, compile it again...
I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar.
Your logic is flawed -- you blame the tools used to do the deed when it's the desire to do the deed which needs resolved. Any skilled person with a good katana could kill as many as these two did in the same amount of time (but with much less noise being made, they'd probably be able to kill many more.)
It's the desire to do this which needs to be addressed and resolved -- placing the blame on the tool does nothing to solve the problem.
Everything in the Universe sucks: It's the law!
Why would individuals want to do this? Media and authority types will not grok the answer because they are culpable, hence all the scape-goating of the net, games, etc.
In a society such as ours which is saturated with advertising-related media, the major effect--and end result--will always be homogenization of culture. The end result of homogenization of a culture is intolerance towards those who either aren't or refuse to be homogenized and who are thus cast out of the system or otherwise marginalized. Once marginalized, they are targeted by those who are willingly homogenized: Think peer-pressure as condoned and encouraged by those in authority at various levels of society (those who run schools, businesses, governments, etc.)
The primary culpret in this tragedy, even if indirectly, is the U.S. media/advertising monstrosity. The secondary culpret is the schools themselves, which are far more oriented towards socialization than towards education, where those who run the schools actively encourage young people to either become homogenized or marginalized. The whole push towards school uniforms for everyone is a push towards homogenization and will result in even more marginalization and acting out by those who don't and won't agree that life is like a Gap commercial.
In summation: Any school in this country where individuals or groups of individuals are exposed to ridicule, ostracism and other forms of punishment for expressing individuality or difference is a breeding ground for just this type of incident. Specifically, I've gleaned that this school in Colorado is typical in that the jock/cheerleader crowd are the "favorites" (very predictable) and ridicule and harrasement of other groups of students is common.
Everything in the Universe sucks: It's the law!
Exerpt:
--Chris Brown
The simplicity of the medias contribution to this issue terrifies me. Are ppl this stupid?
Seriously, overpopulation isn't about how many ppl can fit in a telephone booth (I read an idiot in my college paper thinks there's no overpopulation because you can fit the entire population of the world in the state of Texas with 1/4 acre assigned to each - for what? I don't know... farming, fish hatcheries, concentration camps?)
The ship sank. Get over it. (This sig was cut out from another's shirt and painstakingly hand-posted)
Anyone interested?
/. or Talkback forum.
Tired of yelling at the TV?
Normal news comes in with headlines under the newspaper's masthead. What if it were the other way around. What if you could take headlines and place mastheads under them?
A little competition among newspapers then under that a
The user downloads the news system, installs it on his/her/its web site and adds his/her/its favorite or his/her/its least favorite news sources to the list.
Needs a headline spider or some sort of submission form for stories.
Needs a summary spider that can cut through html tags and select a few lines of news or even a frame's worth to display next to each masthead.
I think the final product should be themes capable (KDE, blackbox, ice, flwm, mwm, WindowMaker, GNOME, etc..) and should be split in three: the newsbin library of spiders, the themes for looks, and user addons such as framing of article forums, and such.
It should not be a news site in itself more like a balanced diet of news.
email firewalk@linuxstart.com
The ship sank. Get over it. (This sig was cut out from another's shirt and painstakingly hand-posted)
This seems to me to be on a higher level than Mindcraft vs Linux. The problem is that while we can objectively rip through a bullshit benchmark, social matters on the other hand are next to impossible. The media plays the idiot at every event while they shrewdly raise their ratings.
However, as a student of complex systems (read: watching the neighbors play house) I know that the more drastic and uncontrolled the act the shorter the life-span of its immediate effects and the more unstable. You may not get get what you asked for.
The ship sank. Get over it. (This sig was cut out from another's shirt and painstakingly hand-posted)
What climate of hate asswipe? You don't even know any of us. But that's part and parcel of Christianity isn't it. Unrelieved judgement of others and unrelieved pity. We don't need your guilt trips hypocrite, and we certainly don't need your fucking help. Who tbe hell are you to help anyone? Have a little respect and ask people if they need it! Giving clothing and money and food to the poor, indeed. more like white-slavery to me. Poor people need to be on their feet not comfortable. Poverty is not a sickness you treat. Poverty is torture you have to put an end to.
Of course all you care about is hunger and cold. People should be warm and have a full stomach. People don't need to have dreams and a life. Bullshit.
So secularism is killing people? How many times have the KKK pulled their beliefs right out of the Bible. So do the Nazis. BTW, Nazism is not a unique and separate phylosophy. Nazi means member of the National Socialist Party. Read a little history and get off your fucking high horse moron. Do you really know who those pilgrims who landed on Plymouth Rock were? A bunch of censoring religious extremists who couldn't get along with all the other religious extremists on mainland Europe not just Anglican Church territory. Wake the fuck up!
Almost every single war in this century has been motivated by a degenerate philosophy or religion.. And for you dense idiots: The word religion has nothing to do with Christianity, Catholicism, etc. Get your head out of the dictionary and breathe a little of the hot air you're blowing. Communism was derived from some philosophy that never took off because people are dense and developed into a degenerate religion. Degenerate, folks (I can't believe I have to explain this, but you force me to) means in this case unwilling to put the religion or philosophy to tests. And the fact that a majority of people were still excited about Communism as they are even now when their world was falling apart proves it.
A book you should read to further you education in Humanity 101: Vasily Grossman's Forever Flowing.
BTW, I happen to believe Jesus did exist and I think all the shroud of Turin does is mystify the truth even more so that Christianity maintains its legend status. The idea the Jesus did not exist is as ludicrous as Holocaust revisionism. The nazis did not invent concentration camps. They've been used in some form or another. Look at the Gulag, Manzanaar (an United States trip through history), Dungeons, as well as Auschwitz.
I also believe he was a pretty cool dude who spent time with thieves, poor people, prostitutes and stayed away from Pharisees like yourself. Why he ever felt he had to put this miserable world on his shoulders I don't know.
I warn you do not even bring up subjects like prostitution and purity. Unless you're willing to defend your ideas.
The ship sank. Get over it. (This sig was cut out from another's shirt and painstakingly hand-posted)
I've been following the coverage of this pretty close and am amazed at the number of warning signs these kids displayed before this final act of violence. Here's the list off the top of my head:
- In "video" class, they made a movie where they walked down the halls shooting the "jocks" that would show their faces (played by their friends).
- Numerous reports of threats to kill other students were made to both police and school officials
- The oldest had moved from NY 3 years earlier and confided in a friend that he was having trouble adjusting and fitting in. While in NY he was a "jock" himself talking about baseball most of the time.
- The father of the oldest killer called police (through proxy) during the first few hours of the incident before ANY names were released. He told them that he felt his child may be one of the killers and he wanted to help them stop the tragedy.
- The "quote of the day" for the students that day was "I bet you wish you weren't here today. 4-20, 4-20, 4-20". No one knows who submitted this quote.
- A few weeks before, the "jocks" and the "trench coat mafia" scheduled a fight on the baseball field after school. When TCM showed up with brass knuckles and swords, the jocks refused to fight and left.
- Bombs were heard going off a few days before the incident behind one of the kids houses.
To me, these are OBVIOUS signs that there was something wrong, VERY wrong. One of the killers fathers even knew and only addressed it AFTER his son had started killing people!
Teachers, school officials, and police ALL turned a blind eye to these problems. Teachers KNOW what kids are popular and what kids are abused, the see it EVERY day. They know MUCH more about what goes on with the kids than they want to admit because then they become implicated in the whole ordeal.
The teacher who saw the video of the mock shooting did not report this disturbing incident to anyone.
The quote of the day where Hitler's birthday is repeated 3 times shows an ugly resemblance to Nazi chants.
Who doesn't hear their kid BLOWING UP BOMBS IN THE BACKYARD?!
These kids also played paintball often, will that be blamed as a "training tool" just as Doom is being blamed? No.
To top this whole thing off, MGM has RECALLED all copies of The Basketball Diaries which some have blamed for this as well. This recall only adds credence to the unfounded claims that entertainment media drives people's actions! It's absurd and a terrible example portrayed by a company too afraid of a multi-million dollar lawsuit.
While the whole ordeal is tragic, I find the aftermath of unfounded blame more sickening.
Okay, you've hit a sore spot with me:
Issue #1: Guns
Guns are now harder than ever to get ahold of in the U.S. You can't just walk into a store and buy one without a wait period and a background check.
These kids got guns. More than likely illegally, by theft or black market. That makes them criminals.
They also made pipe bombs, which are highly illegal, which also killed the most people at the school. Not the guns.
Issue #2: Other influences.
I'm on the internet often. I own guns. I have, and wear, a trenchcoat. I play "violent" video games. I've watched Natural Born Killers and other violent movies. I watch a lot of TV. I came from a middle class family in rural America. I was an outcast. I was teased. I wasn't good at sports in high school. I got my ass kicked a few times just for being the only person to get an A in a class.
YOU DIDN'T SEE ME WANTING TO SHOOT UP MY SCHOOL!!!
By the time I was a junior in high school, I had turned all this around anyway... when I learned we can be what we make of ourselves, not what other people try to make us.
I joined the Army after high school. I am now a successful SysAdmin and marketing manager.
The problem with these kids is that they were seriously disturbed. They lacked the moral filter that most people are born with. They were insane. Plain and simple. No sane person would do what they did. They had guns. They made pipe-bombs. They were criminals.
Read that again: These two kids were criminals, and they were not sane.
So, now you, and those in the government are going to promote the solution to the wrong problems... the solution to what is really not a problem.
More gun restrictions. Make it harder for law-abiding citizens like me to buy guns for sporting purposes and self defense (self defense from criminals like those two kids) So, now criminals will still be able to steal guns or buy them on the black market. Solving the "gun problem" only puts guns into the wrong hands.
We'd better ban video games like Doom and Quake while we're at it. They are obviously a problem, and forcing the millions of people that play them toward violent tendencies.
Oh, and don't forget to treat violent movies like XXX movies. Make sure people feel ashamed when they are asked for their ID to rent or purchase one.
Oh, and no more trenchcoats. Obviously you are violent if you wear one.
That's where all this is leading. America has more violent crimes than ever before, at a time when we have less freedom than we ever had before.
It can also be noted that this kind of stuff happens on government property damn near every time. Whether it's a Post Office, a school, or the local DMV.
At any rate, before I start rambling on this subject, I'll restate why this happened:
This happened because those two INSANE high school kids illegally obtained guns, illegally manufactured explosive devices, and illegally brought them to school.
So, I can describe the problem these two kids had: Criminal insanity.
Nobody in their right mind does stuff like this. It wasn't any outside influence that made them this way. They were born with it. An outside influence may have triggered what was inside their minds, but it was already there.
But go ahead and blame it on guns, games, and movies. Take the easy way out while pursuing your agenda. Why should I care? Because when you take my guns away and criminals are still walking around with their illegal weapons, I'll be getting ready to die anyway, because with each step toward banning guns, you increase the chances of people like me getting killed in violent crime. Thanks
"Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives" should be a convenience store, not a government agency.
I think it was a *very* good thing that the kids had guns available to them. They were *already* using explosives -- do you *really* think that they would have just not bothered if they hadn't had guns?
I very seriously doubt it. I strongly suspect that had they lacked guns, *none* of the people in the school would have survived -- because they would have simply blown the entire place up. You can run and hide from someone with a gun. You can't hide from an explosion. Especially if you don't know it's coming.
Were I a moderator, this comment would have been bumped up.
A damn good point.
"Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives" should be a convenience store, not a government agency.
So what did your last 3 paragraphs have to do with the rest of your argument?
At any rate, from what I've been seeing on the news, the conclusion was that the "pipe bombs used as grenades" were responsible for most of the deaths and injuries.
But this doesn't really matter. The simple fact is, those two kids were obviously insane, and criminal.
I could find it reasonable that a person could have one specific place to direct revenge toward, if driven to a certain point, like killing one person in a fit of rage. But, nobody in their right minds just goes on a killing spree because they feel hated.
Come on, do you really think that ALL the jocks in that school teased them? All the popular people? I seriously doubt it.
Those two were simply messed up in the head. Crazy. Insane. Loco. Whatevery you want to call it, that's what they were.
"Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives" should be a convenience store, not a government agency.
I'm beginning to think that you saw my post as an attempt to justify or excuse the killings in some way. If so, please allow me to apologize. That was not at all my intent. I was rambling about the politics swirling around the whole thing, not about the event itself.
Yeah, that's what I was thinking. Apology accepted, and please accept mine for thinking that.
Now that I think about it, that's pretty depressing, isn't it?
Yeah, it's pretty depressing that it happened, but I think we'll see more of it.
"Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives" should be a convenience store, not a government agency.
When guns are outlawed, outlaws will use pipe bombs.
Oh, oops, they already did.
-russ
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
1) I was a geek in high school. I felt like no one liked me.
2) I had access to a 9mm semiautomatic handgun.
If you are right, then I should have killed my hated classmates. I didn't; therefore you are wrong.
-russ
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
Hey! Where'd you learn to spell?? Probably in a government school.
Yeah, my wife and I blame all this on compulsory schooling. You never see this happening at a sports arena, or a mall. Gotta be a reason why kids go to school to kill.
-russ
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
So why didn't I kill anyone? The answer can only be that your thesis "free access is sufficient" is wrong.
-russ
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
Yup. I hated high school. Junior high was worse. Talk to an botanist, and she'll tell you about monocropping -- the practice of planting a whole field full of one crop. The bugs just love it. Well, in government schools, we monocrop children by age. All the fourteen-year-olds ever do is talk to other fourteen-year-olds. And the way bullying and fighting is tolerated or winked at? This is sick, sick, sick.
-russ
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
Anyway
Whenever something like this happens, the same group of usual suspects is always lined up and paraded in front of the public for analysis. In this case, this motley crew of usual suspects are
However, in the absence of any damning, concrete evidences that actually conclusively faults any of the above-listed suspects, it is perhaps useful to step back and look at the problem from a more fundamental viewpoint.
The crux of the problem is that for whatever reason, people in general (and Americans in particular) are growing less and less tolerant of each other. Respect for and cooperation with others is becoming rarer and rarer. This is not a phenomenon that is observationally limited to kids and high schools. There are signs of this in almost every facet of ordinary, daily life.
Take, for example, the buzzword de jure: "road rage." A careless driver cuts off another driver, who becomes so enraged that he follows the poor bastard to his home, and proceeds to break his jaw. When did we hear about things like this happening, say, ten years ago? What about five? What is it that is promoting this sort of dangerous mindset in what should be a nonthreatening situation?
I don't pretend to know the answer to this question, and similarily, I don't pretend to have a solution. However, in my opinion, trying to identify and fix what's wrong with American's high schools is like irradiating only a small portion of a much larger tumor. People are losing their sense of community. Maybe one day we'll know why.
We're going down, in a spiral to the ground
I agree with your evidence, but not your conclusion. Yes, if a parent goes through their child's stuff then they likely won't be building a trusting relationship. That kind of thing leads to the kid believing "if my parents can't find it, then it's ok. I just have to hide it well." It's stupid parenting, in general.
But parents do have a right to do that. In fact, they have a responsibility to do that if the situation calls for it. Sometimes people make mistakes. When your child makes a mistake, it is your responsibility to correct them. If a child steals a stereo and the parent finds out, does the parent let them keep the stereo? Absolutely not!
If the parent was wrong, then they must apologize. If the parent was correct in making the search, they must not rub it in, but give a way for the child to earn the parent's trust back. A search must not be unwarranted to begin with.
Really, the only right children have is the right to an education, if you look at it from a legal point of view. (I'm not saying this is good). They don't get to pursue happiness if their parents don't want them too. Sucks, don't it.
Parenting is a part of human nature though, and it really rounds out your life. If you don't have children yourself, I highly suggest babysitting your nieces and nephews. Your siblings will thank you too :o)
I agree that there are a lot of people in high-tech jobs where both people in the houseold work long hours. That just doesn't leave much time for raising children. Kids deserve more than that.
On your "point" about Right Wing "engaged in a massive act of communal myth-generation," I don't see that. What I see is people elected in good faith on both sides of the political spectrum falling to the status quo that has existed for ages in our country. A lot of the people that affiliate themselves with a "Wing" don't 100% believe in the spew. I know hard core right-wingers disagree a lot on enviro issues and a lot of hard-core left-wingers side with management at the grass roots level. I think that once a person gets elevated to national status in a party, they get swept up in the politicing and forget what they use to be about. Stereotyping the whole group doesn't get us anywhere.
On to more meat and potatoes...
Yeah, there are a lot of kooks out there screaming out about nationalism, about how the races should be seperate or how there should be just one race, but those people are not what makes up a political faction. Those are people that make up a serious threat to the public at large.
Yes, I can logically see how guns could be a positive thing in this tragedy, but not emotionally. A lot of people think with pure emotion and a lot of people think with pure logic. No one can live by the extremes alone.
I think your post has nothing of value in it.
RB
I think it was a *very* good thing that the kids had guns available to them. They were *already* using explosives -- do you *really* think that they would have just not bothered if they hadn't had guns?
I very seriously doubt it. I strongly suspect that had they lacked guns, *none* of the people in the school would have survived -- because they would have simply blown the entire place up. You can run and hide from someone with a gun.
You can't hide from an explosion. Especially if you don't know it's coming.
Shalon Wood
There is a thread through this whole tableau - of abuse, the in-crowd and the out-crowd, the in-crowd lording it over the out-crowd, people with "power" abusing that power - and the abused lashing back. It is amazing that things are so similar to when I was in high school, 40-44 years ago. Over the years I have learned that each of us is a special creation of the universe, of GOD. I have learned to value each individual, even though this is often a challenge. I have learned that when I reach out to anyone, I give life. When I maintain enriching relationships, life spreads to many. I have also learned that there is evil in the world. M. Scott Peck ("The Road Less Traveled") came to this same conclusion in "People of the Lie". When we abuse the powerless, we open the doors for evil to enter. You can think of this as a "force" of evil, or of Satan, or of darkness - whatever, it is there. When evil takes over, anything can happen. As a wise person observed, all that is needed for evil to triumph is for good people to do nothing.
- -
What can we do? Perhaps it is time for the "leaders" in our schools - students, teachers, and administrators, to reach out to everyone - not to forestall violence, but because every individual has value. How do we do this? When we put our combined minds to work on any problem, wonderful things happen. It starts with realizing that every individual has value, and setting our vision on finding and affirming the value in every individual.
The way out of the Darkness is to walk in the Light.
-----------------------------------------------
Kheeeeee - Khareeeeeeeee!!!
There is a world of difference between actually talking to your kids and just monitoring them like some sort of police state. Rummaging through their belongings isn't going to help your relationship with your child. It will isolate them further, making them paranoid, resentful, and even more secretive. The only way to really 'keep tabs' on your kids is to talk to treat them as equals. You show them respect, trust them until they've earned otherwise, and allow them the same dignities you afford youself.
I dont know where you are getting your statistics about teen violence being down, but you are WRONG, and you are BIG TIME WRONG
A FACT FROM THE CDC National Center for Injury Prevention and Control:
Annual rates of firearm homicide for youth 15-19 years of age increased 155% between 1987 and 1994
In 1995, 7.6% or 1 in 12 students in a national survey reported carrying a firearm for fighting or self-defense at least once in the previous 30 days. In 1990, this was true of 4.1% or 1 in 24 students.
So you see, teen violence DOUBLED in 5 years.
And one of the reasons you dont see as much violence in the inner city schools is because they are more likely to use metal detection devices. The poor, people of color are not to be trusted? In inner cities the violence is away from school.
The the question I've been asking:
Why primarily the US?
This crap doesn't happen in other so-called developed nations, like Australia, Britain, Germany, France, etc.
There HAS TO BE something unique about America and American society that causes this. The British kids listen to heavy metal and grunge and what not, they watch movies, but they're not allowed to own guns. And, they're corporate environment is not quite as demanding, maybe we have just enough extra factors to push us over the edge?
One thing I see is people defending their industries. So, internet workers say, oh no, it cant be the internet, hollywood types say oh no, its not movies
And I have seen a lot of bunk on here about teen violence going down. Well, it went down the last couple of years, but it is still WAY up from ten years ago. And, do we believe the recent statistics. I mean we do have a president who loves to shine in the polls, maybe he can fiddle around with those statistics
I think TV is a factor as well. Look how many kids can talk about all kinds of movies and video games and such. Ask em what Orion is, and the first thing they say is that its a film company. They never heard about the constellation or much less that theres a red giant there, or what a red giant is. Ask em what the primary argument of the civil war was, or why the founding fathers separated church from state. They dont know, but I grew up overseas and the British kids I hung out with knew more about American history, science, math, etc than just about any American kid.
You seem to be arriving at the exact opposite conclusion of your opening statement. You said society was not the cause
Then you go on to say, their parents failed them, their teachers failed them, the law had them in trouble before, but did nothing to get to the root cause. No one payed attention to the early warning signs, etc
Now, I may be wrong, but it seems to me that parents, teachers, cops, counselors, peers, etc - those things basically define society dont they?
How can you say society is not at fault and then go on to blame all the components that constitute society
Its like saying there is nothing wrong with my car, it just has a bad engine, a bad transmission, faulty brakes, and a rusted out body
Yes, it's so intelligent it doesn't make any practical sense. Guns are the ultimate expression of that anger and hopelessness. Notice how these things are alway school "shootings". How many of these students have gone on a ball-peen hammer rampage, NONE! The hammer's primary purpose is for the handling of nails and construction. Yes, it could kill somebody, but thats not the primary image one gets of a hammer.
But a gun...and what about bombs
If guns weren't so readily available, I doubt there would have been so many dead people, which IS the issue. Without the guns, that anger and hopelessness might have been taken out with a fistfight, where at least there might have been SOME hope for resolution. But guns usually leave the anger and hopelessness unresolved, because dead people can't resolve anything.You think the founding fathers didn't separate the church and state. Read these:
"The government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion" John Adams, 1797
"...the path of true piety is so plain as to require but little political direction. To this consideration we ought to ascribe the absence of any regulation, respecting religion, from the Magna-Carta (constitution) of our country" George Washington, 1789
"I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the WHOLE AMERICAN PEOPLE WHICH DECLARED that their legislature should 'make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the FREE exercise thereof', thus, building a wall of separation between Church and State" Thomas Jefferson, 1802 (emphasis added)
"Governments are limited by the ESSENTIAL DISTINCTION between civil and religious functions" James Madison, 1811 (emphasis added)
"Leave the matter of religion to the family, the altar, the church, and the PRIVATE school, supported entirely by PRIVATE contributions. Keep the church and state forever separate" Ulysses S. Grant, 1875
It's looking to me like these kinds of kids are becoming more and more average
Unfortunately, the wrong conclusion is drawn here: the problem is not one of homogenization, but one of intolerance. Yes, the media do posit a particular worldview, and the in-crowd would seem to buy in to that- but the fact that there are individuals who actually think different is the root problem. Socialization is exactly what needs to happen: some people apparently are not being taught how to be human.
I think school uniforms, to pick an example, would be a good thing. It could force debate from an easily digested level at schools to a higher level. Dressing differently is an easy target for those who would scorn; why not make it more difficult for the jocks?
Because of my size, I was never picked on at school, in spite of being a proto-geek. Besides, I didn't really care- the whole party attitude has never appealed to me, and I had good friends. But many I knew were tormented. I would like to see the national debate steered this way, to discussing the high school environment, and what can be done to make it into a more civil environment.
A local elementary school has a rigorous anti-teasing policy, with teachers trained at stopping the practice. I think that's more along the lines of what needs to happen.
stored on computers from birth to the grave
You know... I wear black, and play Quake, and know how to make a multitude of dangerous things. I had no idea that I could go berzerk and start a killing spree. I'm glad some one warned me. I'll have to watch myself very closly from now on.
I also ask "where were the parents?" You can be shure that if I was storing propane tanks in my garage that one of my parents would have noticed and bothered to ask about them. It is far esier for the media to blame the "evil" internet rather than look at the parents and home life, mainly because the home life angle has been used to death. People need a bigger and more ominicent thing to have irrational fears over.
If a parent gives a child candy once in a while it is a treat. If the child is constantly allowed to eat candy, and infact forced to on occasion they become sick of the candy. It all goes to the repression argument that if I only give you a little it is intising, but If you have too much you either sicken of it or just don't care about it.
A good example of this can bee seen in Japan. Japan has probably the most violent media cultures around. Thier magazines, TV, and movies regularly dipict content that would be kicked out of the "Land of the Free, Home of the Brave" yet despite this violent culture, they have some of the lowest rates of violent crimes (murder, rape, etc...)
People are so quick to make comments and blame things like doom, and quake, and "Natural Born Killers", or "The Basketball Diaries" (seen that clip more than the killers clip)
But what noone ever thinks about, is that maybe the parents are to blame! If the parents were to pay attention to what their kids were doing, then maybe their kids would be less psychopathic (I know the stats are low, but damn when these things happen they dominate the news and everyone thinks that young people are psychopaths.)
How can those two kids basically run a bomb factory right out of their homes without their parents knowing about it? That's my question, and how did they find time to do that?? In between viewings of the basketball diaries, and games of quake II with their clan???
The media shouldn't be so quick to blame computers or the internet...remember it's the parents that allow kids to use the net or play these games, or watch these movies. And if you're not gonna pay attention to your kids, or if they lose their novelty after 10 yrs old, then do the world a favor, and sterilize yourself.
damn...sorry so long
There's a great deal of difference between paying attention and 'keeping tabs' on your child and searching their stuff. I know if my parents had read the stories i wrote, read the books i read, or just gone through my stuff in general i'd probably have been thrown in an institution. Not because i'm an antisocial freak or something, i just liked novels that would probably have been deemed 'inappropriate' for someone my age. No, they werent hardcore porn, just adult sci-fi and fantasy.. niven, foster, salvatore, various less well known authors.
In keeping with those tastes, my writings were about equally mature stuff.. not sappy 'pre-teen' oriented drivel that we usually feed minors. Sure, my short stories probably werent very good, but then i was young and i've gotten better.. but i wrote about love, death, sorrow.. things we usually try to hide from our children.
For some reason we, as a society, seem to think that our kids need to be sheltered from the world. That's why the internet is seen as such a horrible influence. Not because it's showing our kids things that are so horribly wrong, but because they're finding out about things that we dont want them to know. As adults we have no problems with watching violent movies, playing supposedly 'adult-themed' games, reading books with 'adult situations'.. and if you've never in your life looked at a porn mag there's something seriously wrong with you. You might not like any of the above things, but that's your person prefrence. They all exist and they all make enough money that it's obviously not just a minority that Does like them.
So why do we hide these things from our children? Because when We were children they were hidden from us. But we dont remember the anger and frustration at our parents for refusing to allow us to see the movies we wanted to see etc.. we just remember what our parents drilled into our heads over and over: "Those things arent good for children to see". We have all these problems with people coming out of school not ready for the real world, with teenage pregnancy etc. perhaps the problems are because we are hiding things from our children rather than Teaching them.
Dont tell your kid 'violence is awful and horrible and doesnt really happen'. Tell them the truth, it Does happen, every day. Let them see the news stories about things like the colorado killings. They wont think it's cool, they'll realize that these are real people who are losing their lives. Kids arent nearly as stupid as we seem to want to think they are. They CAN understand supposedly 'adult' concepts, but we spend so much time hiding them that we think they cant.
Dreamweaver
"If a man hasn't discovered something he will die for, he isn't fit to live" -- MLK, Jr.
While it can be shown through statistics that a correlation exists between violence in video games and tv and real life violence, it can absolutely not be proven which one is a cause of the other. It is equally as valid to assume that a rise of violence in society is responsible for the existence of extremely violent games as it is to assume that video games cause greater violence.
Everyone's looking for someone to blame; why not blame the two kids who shot everyone?
I fit in with all of the things that supposedly create killers. I am a 21 year old white male. I play games like Doom, Quake, and Postal, and use the internet regularly. I Wear black clothing, and a trench coat, and was abused by my brother as a child and classmates for years, does this make me a killer? Not in the slightest, I hate violence and confrontation in real life. I don't even fight when challenged, I walk away. All of this hype is crap. The truth is no one knows what makes a killer. There is no real profile you can go by. You can even see this in the millitary. Soldiers are trained to kill, but when confronted face to face with the enemy only about 10% fire! That means 90% of people TRAINED to kill can't. So how can you blame games, clothes, and the net for killing? It is in our nature not to kill our own species. The only reasons I can find for the rise in youth violence is the ready availability of weapons, and explosives. As well the media gives violence so much attention that anyone that watches the news is bombarded with more REAL violence then you are FAKE violence in games. To all of the people that want to stop the violence I say start with loosing the weapons, and look for erlier signs, they are there.
Esslan?
You had it there, then you lost it... I agree when kids come home to an empty home they lose out. They become detached from their parents... However, I'm wondering exactly what right from wrong the school system is suppose to teach children. I suppose that you would suggest the teachers sit the children down in an auditorium and "teach" the children that killing your classmates is inappropriate behaviour. Please, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to understand that ending someone else's life is "wrong". Honestly I think if you want to understand why children kill their classmates, their families, and themselves I think you need to understand how they feel about themselves. From what I understand these two boys were treated as outcasts from their school system. They were picked on/abused, etc... and God help the world if they have any sense of self worth left. When people feel picked on they turn and look for someone or something to hurt in return for their abuse, and society teaches us that getting even isn't enough, we need to get ahead. I'm not going to tell you what they did can ever be justified, I'm telling you I think treating people like shit, because you think it's funny can sometimes turn around and bite you in the ass.
I'm not sure what you mean by this... Every action has a consequence, I don't believe that needs to be taught--a little observation bring that to light.
ok now this has turned into a rant and i probably lost all continuity there... AH... yeah ya did.
>(yes, we lose some freedom.. but even preventing wanton murder is curtailing someone's freedom. It's not a black and white issue.. grow up.)
"Those who give up liberty to gain security deserve neither" either Addams or Jefferson
GUNS DO NOT KILL PEOPLE...PEOPLE DO! There is NO WAY to eliminate guns in the US and still have a country worth living in. PERIOD. It will never happen. There are WAY too many already here and WAY too easy to smuggle in more, not to mention the fact that they are not hard to make.
Frankly, I don't want to be unarmed when the only people with guns are the government and outlaws. The police will tell you outright that they are NOT responsible for your protection. They just clean up afterwards.
If you are thinking I will be defending the traditional, religious-oriented, values, you are wrong. Actually, I think the traditional values, while valid in many cases, really don't help people see the big picture in terms of what is important for the society as a whole.
The traditional values, some of them codified as religious laws, pretty much evolved the same way Humans evolved and they are, thus, the memes that survived the test of time. But are they the best values? I don't think so.
Many of these values, closly connected to religious doctrines, are irrational by nature. People accept them because they think they were written by some kind of god or because they were simply taught this way. But this is not good enough!
The values itself should be questioned and the authority of those who proclaim them too. Blindly accepting moral values is no different than blindly accepting any other kind of lie or delusion. What we need, more than anything, are people able to think for themselves and not be easely influenced by some more radical propositions. What we really need is the ability to think critically. What we really need is critical thinking!
Most Americans are not critical thinkers. (I am Portuguese and, unfortunately, the situation is not much different in Portugal.) If they were, many would not be accepting the religious "truths" with so much ease, like creationism, for instance. And if you are not able to think critically, you are not able to justify WHY your ideas, your values, are better than some NAZI ideas or values.
But critical thinking, as important as it is, is not an end in itself. Critical thinking is only a tool. You need something else. And no, it's not some kind of god. If you use the "god's will" argument, first you have to justify the very existance of that god and why you should listen to it. And if you cannot do that (and you really can't!) you are teaching your kids to not question their own ideas, including their possible NAZI ideas, for example.
What you need to teach to your kids is something that is even more universal than religious values. What you need to teach your kids is that one has to considerer other people's interests if one is to expect to have their own interests considered as well. In the end, it is really this simple.
Sorry Hooptie, your argument doesn't hold. There is a clear correlation between the availability of firearms and the rate of violence. This is the main reason school-killings like this last one rarely happens in Europe, where the laws for firearms are much more restrictive than in the USA. I can recall but one school-massacre in europe, in the UK a few years ago.
To kill is not a civil liberty, and the society doesn't get safer with more guns. Quite the opposite.
I also believe that TV / movie / game violence has an effect on the youth. Especially the kind of "mild" violence thats so prominent in American large-budget Action/Comedy movies. You get used to violence and dont think much of it. Street-violence is however much worse than on the big screen, but people care less about that too as it appears so often in movies (often uses by the "good guys" to solve problems...)
// Simon
The most lethal weapon of mass killing in American history was a gas can and a match
Actually, I think the most lethal weapon was a truck, some fertilizer and fuel oil. Same point though: If someone wants to do damage, they will. Of course, having said that I still believe that ready access to tools designed for the sole purpose of killing large numbers of people (assault rifles, huge capacity magazines) only makes the situation worse by 'lowering' the threshold of violence. Remember, in the rash of school murders that has occured recently, the weapon of chioce has been firearms. This is the only instance I can think of where other methods were also employed. Perhaps this is only the first case in a new pattern. I hope not, but the future is often so much bleaker than we wish.
Actually, I never sugested making guns illegal, just large capacity magazines and assault weapons. Will this solve the problem? Of course not, we have to change our culture of 'violence is so cool I just have to buy a Kalishnakov even though I don't know how to shoot, won't take lessons and will keep the thing, loaded, in the hall closet'. Stupidity will always present chances to the desperate, or the desperatly ill. If you want to own a firearm fine, just know how to use and store it, safely. It is absurd that you have to pass a test to drive a motorcycle, but not to own a lethal weapon. I am, once again for emphasis, not advocating the, frankly impossible, total ban on all firearms in this country. I just want us to start treating weapons as weapons and stop pretending that all Americans are born with the native sense to know how and when to shoot a firearm.
>Children do not have a "right" to privacy, >especially when it comes to computers. With all >of the posts that say parents should take >responsibility for what their kids do, you can't >allow "private" files on a computer, esp. one that has net access.
Searching through a child's things and files is not the way to get to know your child and be there for them. Talking to them and spending times with them is. Looking through their things will just widen the gap between children and parents and eliminate trust.
The right to personal privacy is a generally accepted right(protected under Amendment 9). If children don't have this right, when does it become applicable? Would it be just for the people in charge of you, the government, to search through your private things? It is not that far a step, not to sound paranoid.
I wonder if anyone can stop flaming Mr. Katz long enough to look at the validity some of his arguements. However, I think that the media still exaggerates things.
We live in a society whose obsession with death, the darkside, and violence is supposedly the greatest in all of history. Who teaches history these days? There have been many ancient, and even more recent cultures whose obsession with occult, death, and violence rivaled our own. Just look at the Egyptians and their tombs, the Western Europeans during the Renaissance/Reformation, the multitude of invasions from the east by nomads (barbarians to the locals), the druids, American Indians, Aztecs, Mayans, Incas, etc.
Their art, literature, religeons, oral traditions, and methods of warfare are no different than ours at the most basic level of expressing human needs.
Life is just as messed up as it always has been, if you are a pessimist or cynic. I say, "Its's the same old song and dance. It's just a different tune."-- ST:TNG
Let the flames begin!
Romanes eunt domus? People called Romanes, they go the 'ouse? It says Romans go home. No it doesn't. What's Latin fo
Just coz it's written down doesn't mean it's right. Our society ain't doing to badly. Faced with an armed incerection they may not be right to fire on people but they'd feel a lot better about it. Lucky the Dividians had all thouse guns or they'd really have be in trouble.
America may get respect for a lot of things. The right to bear arms is not one of those things.
----------------------- Nothing to say, no one to say it to.
I can't believe you said that. Kosovo is the break up of countries. There have been problems in that area of the world for a long long time. It's not the Kosovian goverment that's doing it. It the Yogoslavian goverment. The Kosovians do actually have some troops but not enough.
There are many more countries where they don't have this infantial infatuation with firearms and they don't go around trying to round up undesirables.
Not being an expert on these things I'd say that the crime problems in China are nothing to do with the weapons they have, the results of the crimes probably are.
----------------------- Nothing to say, no one to say it to.
3 years ago I've just finished speaking to a friend in Dunblane scotland where it happened. I'm pretty sure that the people living there would not want more people to have guns and they actually started a compaign to have all guns banned.
The man who did the shooting had a legal permit to have the gun, and there where a lot of questions asked as too why he was allowed the gun in the first place. Better gun control could well have averted this tragedy.
----------------------- Nothing to say, no one to say it to.
But if all guns are illegal it makes it 100 times hard to break any of the above. You may still be able to get guns illegally but with less guns arround there will be less illegal guns around. Guns start of as possesed legally and then move to illegal possesion. Less guns, less guns.
----------------------- Nothing to say, no one to say it to.
Oh give me a break. I'm sat here in england and where doing just fine with the un-realistic situation of not letting the general public have firearms. Sure people get shot, but at least because having a firearm is harder to do leagaly someone is more likely to get arrested for having the gun than using it.
People will find other ways of killing people, but I'd far rather someone came at me with a kinfe than a gun.
We do have bombers but there's always going to be people who are screwed up and make life as difficult as possible for them is the least we can do.
If your worried about the goverment having guns. Why give them an excuse to fire on you. If you don't have guns they'll a lot less inclinded to shot at you.
----------------------- Nothing to say, no one to say it to.
Something has to take the blame, because otherwise America would have to face up to some pretty nasty truths: namely that some people are just psychopathic, whether it be genetic or a mental illness, some people have an inbuilt desire to hurt and to kill.
A failure to face up to these facts leads to the sort of pathetic response that we've seen from Charlton Heston. We'll blame their trenchcoats, we'll blame the internet, we'll blame Marilyn Manson, we'll blame *anything* as long as we don't have to confront the reality that this sort of person will always be around, and if you give them access to guns they will kill, and they'll kill you before you've even reached for your gun.
The plain truth is that there will always be would-be killers. The only way to reduce the number of people they actually kill is to take away the means of mass slaughter - ie guns. It's so simple. As a friend of mine put it, "if i feel like killing people and i have access to guns, it's easy. if i only have access to bananas, i might still be able to kill someone, but it's a lot more difficult".
--
Jamm!n
Jamm!n
a perl CGI script using DNA spoofing to masquerade as a unix sysadmin
When people have free access to firearms, they use them.
Just ask your self the last time you heard of a school shooting in Canada.
Most Americans are mislead into thinking owning a gun protects them from aggresive government. Unfortunately, the American government rules by propoganda. not by force. Its a much more subtle and effective means of control, and completely bypasses the gun nuts.
One thing people don't realize about "The Right to Bear Arms" is that this is not only to protect yourself from criminals but also from the government.
The American government generally controls through propoganda, not force. When they do resort to force, they have much larger guns than you will ever have, and more skilled people using them.
This continuing myth seems very amusing.
Gun nuts across the country seem assured that their hunting rifle protects them from the excesses of government.
When was the last time an armed standoff ended with the lone rifleman victorious? Remember Waco - when the government needs bigger guns than you, they can get them very very quickly and use them in a very arbitrary fashion.
Guns do not protect you from an abusive governmnent, unless you happen to own a better variant of the M-1 tank than they do.
The control of information is the real battle ground. Government and corporations have most Americans truly hypnotized. This subtle form of control is very effective.
so would you rather be totally helpless or at least have something to try and fight back with
You already have everything you need to fight back with - its between your ears. The information-plane is the real battle ground now. Use encryption!
THANK GOD!!!!! Finally, a voice of reason among the screaming and hysterical ignorance!
Meghan
Bravo.....extremely well said.
Meghan
I lived for a year in Japan, and one of the saddest thing I saw was the semi-tolerated tradition of kids picking out one kid to torment because they acted different or looked different. This group-picking-on is called "ijime" and the child who this happens to is called the "ijimeko."
This day-in, day-out torment can be so bad that children kill themselves to get away from it.
The thing that struck me about this whole Colorado situation is that every seems to agree that lots of people picked on these kids every day. Now, I'm not saying that their reaction was proportionate, nor am I saying that they didn't go out of their way to be picked on, but it's interesting that very few news items have picked up on this.
I sometimes think that adults forget what constant picking-on can do to your mental health.
"Nightmarish high school massacres like the one in Littleton are now an almost ritualistic part of American life."
/.'ers went to theirs?). HS Massacres still fall into the "random acts of violence" category.
No. Prom is a high school ritual. Something virtually all HS Students do (though I didn't - how many
"And increasingly when they occur, journalists and educators blame new media like the Internet, computer games like Doom or violent movies."
This hasn't changed in a long time. Media has always done this - at least since I noticed media (graduated HS in 1986 - then it was D&D and Ozzy).
"Why kids kill this way is an urgent and complicated question."
Well, complicated anyway.
"But teenaged crime isn't rising, it's falling. And there's no evidence that the Net or other new media are the reason for massacres."
Nice to hear, could you site references?
And this is just the first paragraph...
Kurt Werle
p.s. I can't spell - could we have a "Spell" button with "Submit" and "Preview"?
I swear to god, reading the swill that Jon Katz presents as writing is more than enough to force me on a homicidal rampage.
What the hell is wrong with this complete idiot?
-- DAMN YOU ALL TO HELL YOU BASTARDS! DAMN YOU ALL TO HELL! YOU BLEW IT UP!
"Statistically, children are more likely to have an airplane fall out of the sky and kill them than they are to be shot in school..."
Do you mean while riding in said airplane or standing on the ground and having a plane land on top of them?
As for an incident where a child was crushed by an airplane falling on top of him, I have none in recent memory.
If you mean children riding in airplanes, I'll bet the stats still aren't far off.
Where I went to high school (Southridge Senior High - Miami, Florida) we had a student shot on campus each of the three years I was there. Two of them died, one is paralyzed from the neck down. I graduated in 1990.
I wouldn't play down violence in schools. It is real, and those stats are bunk.
Talisman
"Study your math, kids. Key to the universe." -The Archangel Gabriel
==================
DON'T SEND FLOWERS
==================
While the tragedy in Denver has (yet again) forced America to focus a critical eye on the activities of children, what will the long-term outcome be?
Zip. Zilch. Zero. The nada enchilada.
The rigmarole that always follows these atrocities is useless at best. At worst, it further desensitizes an already cold public.
I do sympathize with the people in Littleton, but do they really give a damn? Should they? They don't know I exist. They shouldn't care how I nor anyone else feels aside from themselves.
Their children are dead. They aren't coming back. But there goes the American public sending flowers and "I'm so sorry your entire life was annihilated" cards. The poor parents of those children will be inundated by worthless condolences in a matter of days.
I assure you they would cheerfully trade every flower bouquet on Earth for just 1 more second with their child. One smile, one laugh, one more breath would justify any barter.
For the public to even halfway entertain the notion that a paper card and wilting vegetation will somehow offset the misery that belongs to those parents is absurd. But it won't stop them. It never does.
The stock reaction to tragedy seems to be the sending of flowers. Remember Diana. They needed a bulldozer and a dump truck to clean up the resulting mess. And did the senders ever bother to think who they were sending the flowers to? Was it Diana?!?
When people commit such acts it is generally to make themselves feel better. There is NO WAY that a handful of flowers will make the victims, direct nor residual, feel better. The only thing that will return those parents/relatives/friends to a normal state-of-mind is the return of their loved one and that isn't going to happen.
But I'll bet my wallet that they feel as if it is.
Every day that passes, the parents wait for the familar clicks of a key turning in the front door lock, knowing it won't happen but feeling as if it should.
Girlfriends wait for their nightly phone calls that will never beckon them again.
Little brothers eagerly wait for their sisters so they can show them their new muscles, new toys, new pet. They will wait for eternity.
Therein lies the tragedy, the people that are left behind. Regardless of your religious beliefs or absence thereof, death isn't so awful. You either go to Heaven, are stuck in limbo, get reincarnated or simply go to sleep forever. We'll leave out the Hell option since, after all, these were kids.
The real Hell is reserved for the living victims. The ones closest to those slain have been permanently altered mentally and emotionally. How many times will a father imagine the final moments of his daughter's life? How many times will he see her on her knees, begging her to-be killer to spare her life only to have the zombie coldly pump lead into her beating heart?
And the mothers. My God, the mothers. Can a mother deal with this? Is it possible? Everytime she undresses and sees the stretch marks on her breast from the son that once suckled her body, the very body that intimately carried him for months, she will remember that he is gone forever. No more hugs in the morning. No more letting him borrow the family car. No more admiring the years of hard work it took to mold him into a young man. That is all over.
The pathos of this tragedy and those like it is that it can never be rectified. It can never be fixed. Out of necessity, the relatives and friends will harden the parts of their soul that need it so they can go on, but they won't heal. That doesn't happen. You scab over, you calous, you don't heal. You can't return to normal after something like this. It isn't an option.
When faced with the consequence of an irreparable situation, the only defense you have is prevention. But instead of making real changes to alter society, here is exactly what America will do:
We will argue.
We will blame.
We will sue.
We will cry.
We will send flowers.
But we will DO nothing. The next time it happens, and it WILL happen again, we'll repeat the same steps.
The tragedy is with the living as much as it is the dead.
All I ask is that if this ever happens to me or my family, please, don't send flowers.
Talisman
"Study your math, kids. Key to the universe." -The Archangel Gabriel
I agree completely.
When I was in high school, I was one of the geeks
who was continuously abused. In my high school,
the jocks beat the shit out of the geeks on a daily basis.
Did I dream of getting back at them? Of course so. Could I have gotten to weaponry to get back at them? Sure. In America, anyone with half a brain can get access to guns if they want.
Why didn't I? Because I was raised by terrific
parents.
That's the missing link in all of these cases. What causes this kind of violence? Bad parenting.
But the parents don't want to take the responsibility for how they've raised their children, so they need to find scapegoats.
No. Sorry. That just doesn't fly.
When your kid is at school, blowing up shrapnel filled bombs and shooting other kids, it's just two damned late to be intervening.
Where was that father when his kid was making bombs in the garage? Where was that father when the kid was buying automatic weapons and ammo?
The simple reason that kids kill is the exact same reason that anyone kills. The 'pressures' of the situation reach that persons 'breaking point'. This 'breaking point' is different for everyone and is determined by a myriad of factors in a persons life.
The other question is why are we seeing more 'postal' incidents? The reason here is population growth. There are just plain more people ina a given geographical area. The more people the more people there are that reach their 'breaking point'. The more people that are around when that 'breaking point' is reach the more victims there will be.
There have always been acts of violence in human society. The specifics relate to circustances at the time. We had gangsters in the 20's and 30's. Cowboy outlaws in the 1800's. Pirates before that.
I have no cure to the problem of why some people are less 'stable' then others and are thus more likely to 'crack' under pressure. Heck I don't even know the causes. The real sad part in how these situations are addressed is that people want to be able to assign blame to a single source, and definitely not themselves, when there is no single reason.
We must remember that we are all just a few incidents away from the circumstances that would make use kill. Maybe it is to protect someone, maybe out of rage, maybe out of vengence, who knows, but the possibility is always there.
I have yet to understand why these people keep calling these two "kids." They are not kids. If they were out of school they would be encouraged to go to some other country and shoot guns at bad guys and be called "men" for it. Isn't that what our noble army is all about? Perhaps these children should be given an award since they have managed to successfully complete a terrorist attack on the United States of America. They have caused so much irrational fear that people are changing their way of life... the exact definition of terrorism. Watch "The Siege"... at the part where the bus backfires, you will understand why this was terrorism at its finest.
4/20 is the national day to smoke dope... the media is so wrong.
Or pile of crap! The age old notion that without the US, Europe would all be talking German.
Before the US joined the war (WWII) (Churchill apparently knew you were to be attacked, but kept quiet as he knew you'd join in later), they were quite happily supplying arms, money and info to BOTH sides.
You assisted, but then so did Russia (they turned of the winter heating!!), as did many other countries who fought on principle (Australia, New Zealand for example). On your own, you'd have lost (It was the British who cracked the Enigma, with the help of a couple of Polish guys). On Britain's own she'd have lost. It was a collective effort.
Practically all OECD countries do quite well without an armed civilian population, and rely on democracy to kick out unpopular governments. Don't believe for one minute that your guns are any match for the military's firepower.
Yes, there have been one or two incidents of mass killings, but they are rare (Aramoana and Raurimu). The police, like those in the UK, generally do not carry guns, unless they are in the diplomatic protection squad.
.45, black powder etc.) and enjoyed it, but I can't see any good reason to allow people to bear arms in a modern society.
Guns laws are strict (not as strict as Oz), especially with pistols (basically you must belong to a club, etc. etc.) No automatic guns, and semis are restricted to a fairly low number of rounds. All guns must be locked in approved lockers, and the firing mechanism and ammo must be seperately secured. All owners are licensed, and must pass some basic safety training.
I used to do target shooting, and liked it, including pistol (9mm,
Yes the criminals do get guns, but there is nowhere near the problem the US has.
I think you should do a bit more research. The gun laws are much tighter now in NZ too.
Hand guns are illegal in NZ, except if you belong to a licensed Pistol club. Automatic rifles are illegal, as are many semi automatics.
Guns must me securely locked at all times, in an approved case, the firing mechanism must be seperately and securely locked, as must the ammo.
Same for transporting a gun in a car.
All gun owners are licensed. This includes basic safety training. For a pistol, you must belong to a club for at least two years before ou can get the additional license.
Most guns in NZ are probably shotguns, which are destructive at relatively short ranges. Pump action ones are limited in the number of shots they can hold.
Machine guns/pistols and anything like assauly rifles are banned (you get a few years in one of the Govt. hotels, no room service).
Hell, most of our Police don't carry guns (unless they are on solo night duty in certain areas, when they can carry them locked, in the car, Diplomatic protection squad, and armed offender's squad when they are called out - btw, these guys have balls of steel - I have seen one have a gun pointed at him, and he didn't shoot! They are very good at negotiating, and rarely have to shoot).
No, I don't think your gun laws are sensible in the modern age. It has nothing to do with free speech (which we also have).
Katz writes: Why are so many of these killers male and middle-class, rather than the poor or the underclass?
If a statistically significant number are middle-class, there actually could be a correlation to game-playing and on-line browsing - which would also seem to be related to middle-class (and up).
While it's a huge jump to attribute any sort of cause and effect relationship, there is something here worthy of further study.
We've all heard the statistics, the explanations, the confusion. What seems to be a bit of pervasive ignorance however, are the things that are being constantly ignored.
What are those?
I know this idea isn't new, and it seems to have gotten lost in the shuffle. In Japan, media and violence in entertainment are actually much more prevalant than they are, yet their crime rates are lower. One suggestion is that in a world where frustrations, anger, and annoyance abound, it's nice to have some kind of outlet, so the buildup doesn't start entering real life. The net, games such as Quake, and music have all been cited as examples of violence; the fact is, they might be having the exact opposite effect. Children and adults who watch violent movies, who play violent games, have their anger and frustrations sated before they start taking them out on actual people.
From what I understand, these kids had a lot of anger. Who wouldn't? I know what it's like to be ridiculed through high school. No, it didn't turn me into a mass murderor, but it did make me quite bitter. Luckily I had peers, people who made it all worth the hardship. Without that, I don't know where I would be. If kids are treated as unwanted, they lash out. What was it those two kids were yelling? "This is what you get for treating us like that!" or something similar? I agree that it's no excuse, but something should have been done before this happened. Things only explode if you let them build up enough.
Sometimes people fall through the cracks. They get depressed and kill themselves, or they become angry at their situation and those who caused it, and do as much damage as they can. If there is any blame to pass, blame the uncaring selfish masses that ridicule people who are different until they want to die or kill.
Besides that, media only reflects the violence inherant in a culture. If people didn't like it, they wouldn't buy it, and media would change accordingly or lose money. The crazies that do get ideas from movies or music would have done something anyway, just something different. Some people are just born killers, with no concience, paranoid delusions, or whatever label applies. Children abused and beaten by parents, broken families, pressure from all sides. There are many more uncited causes that people seem to ignore.
The simple fact is: Until we learn to be more accepting of differences beyond racial or sexual issues, we'll continue to generate people who don't fit, and feel alone. I know, I'm one of them. I only try every day to make sure that nobody else falls into the same cracks that I did.
Society could learn a few things from freaks like me.
Shaun Thomas: s-thomas@cornell-iowa.edu
Cornell College WebTeam
Math/CSC/Physics Major -* ICQ #13671332 *-
http://www.kildosphere.com
Read: Rabbit Rue - Free serial nove
The cause of Littleton is a no-brainer. It's the same reason for all the violent rampages in every school that have been and will be. Someone needs to get it thought these kids heads that tormenting other students will result in tragedy.
Sure, blame it on guns, drugs, video games, movies, etc... Avoid the truth... Then this will happen again and again.
The psychological effect on a kid of being constantly picked on is enormus, and it's no wonder that now and then a kid freaks out.
Find a way to prevent ridicule, and this problem will go away.
I've been reading a good portion of the follow-ups here (which takes quite a while .. ;) )
...quite improbable...
And One recurring thing that stings me to the bone is that ppl still think that is normal to carry an item that has been made for one purpose and one purpose only, killing. You can give it whatever name you want, "gun, semi-automatic, shotgun", it's original design is still the same, destroy/break/kill/maim the subject aimed.
Now I do understands that it is Constitutional to bare a gun, and it's every American's right too.
But did anyone ever consider that since the time were your brave forefathers fought their way free, time has quite changed, in fact more than 220 years have passed. And the chances that a neighboring country decides to make a Colony out of New York, is
So know that we've got these facts down, I'm not saying that if there were stronger laws on gun
control, the Denver shooting wouldn't have happened, those kids may have used "legal or easier to get" weapons, but with a stronger set of laws, they could also have been cough doing so.
But what I'm getting at, is that they might have killed less kids in there attack, if for example they we're not using semi-automatics (as one of you pointed out, semi-automatics give you a better aim if not a better firing rate). It's just an example as dumb as the next, but still if 3,4 even 5 more lives were saved, that would mean a lot, and if you don't think so, try explaining your point of vue to the victim's parents.
Another one of you pointed out that on of the murderers' father was a marine, and that no amount of gun control could have stop him access to his daddy's private reserve.
Well it's probably right, but in any case just loops back to what I was saying in the beginning of my rant, that If you don't educate children that guns are simply note a solution, it's barely an excuse for hunting, and that the only use for the public would be for sport competition, then I can guarantee you that those kind of massacres would simply not be possible.
I'll just add to this fairly long rant of mine, that I live in Switzerland, a country that has a militia type of army. What that means is that every adult male citizen (and a couple of crazy few females) have at home an Assault riffle, with ammo, gas masks, and the likes. But I've been brought up, as most of my friends to "dislike" guns because of their single minded purpose, to destroy/break/kill/maim
Murphy(c).
He wasn't a student. One of the reasons he reacted is because he didn't get into the school, and he thought that women had taken his place.
-- Will quantum computers run imaginary-time operating systems?
That's a nice statistic, but without context, it's meaningless. Have they done studies to show that the CAUSE of the increase is the gun control laws? And, if it turns out that it isn't the gun control laws that have caused the increase, then it must be due to some other factor. Then, how do you know if it wouldn't have increased even MORE without the laws.
Statistics without context are meaningless.
--
-- Will quantum computers run imaginary-time operating systems?
There was an interesting "Law & Order" (NBC) a few weeks ago where the District Attourney in the show took this nazi propagandist to court on 2nd degree murder charges for inciting adolescent boys to murder. The argument was that he filled the heads of these boys (that had commited the murder) with hatred and thoughts of murder when the boys were already unstable and likely to commit crime already. He pushed them over the edge it was argued.
Clearly this is a contrived "made for TV" TM example however the underlying point is still valid I think. The kids that commited this crime were clearly unstable, and I don't think we can say that violent movies like "Natural Born Killers" or video games, or you choose your own technological/media demon had NO influence on these kids. Perhaps this exposure tipped them over the edge.
If someone is convinced that killing 25 people is a good idea, your first response to them should probably NOT be "well... killing isn't a big deal" This is to some extent what I think the images from popular culture tell us.
Don't get me wrong. I enjoy games like Doom and I thought "Natural Born Killers" while repugnant and disturbing was a VERY WELL DONE movie. However, I don't think we can understate the POTENTIAL effect on our kids. Obviously we can't tell but maybe if these kids had spent a little less time indulging their violent "tooth", Littleton CO would still be a little place in CO that nobody has heard of.
The first thing I thought of when I heard about the shootings was, 'Someone finally went after the jocks.' I know it's bad, I know it's definitely not PC, and I'm not saying the shootings were right because they weren't, but the jocks and their female equivalents were, without a doubt, the worst part of high school. And after hearing the responses of self-proclaimed Columbine HS jocks, my knee-jerk response was confirmed. No *wonder* the two kids went after them. Christ. I'd be tempted to too.
... just like the politicians do. And that leads the people in charge--parents and school administrators and the like--to make "easy fixes" that, in the end, usually fuck things up even more. If you tell the disenfranchised kids that they can't wear black coats any more, then you've taken away a means of expressing themselves (and of at least fitting in with one little group). If you tell them they can't listen to certain types of music, or they can't play certain computer games or use the internet, then you've taken away other outlets of expressing individuality. If you threaten to read a teenager's diary or whatever else to find out whether they're homicidal, then you've taken away the final outlet. And then how do we expect students to express themselves, their pain? The only way left is through drastic physical action--killing themselves or someone else. But the people in charge pick on these things because they are easy to control and fix. So they shouldn't be shocked when, after ignoring the major problems and removing means to express individuality, these sorts of killings only become more common.
Of course, the difference is I never did, but I think that the people who don't take their anger out on others end up taking it out on themselves, and why should that be any more acceptable? Why don't we get this sort of media coverage each time a depressed student kills him- or herself?
Not that the media coverage helps things. When you're a depressed teenager, you don't want to think about living any longer--you *can't* imagine living any longer. And so the best route seems to be going out in a blaze of glory, either by killing yourself (THEN your family will be sorry they didn't realized something was wrong) or by shooting everyone who made you miserable. And if you *really* want a blaze of glory, killing other people seems the way to go, because look how much attention these other teenage murderers got.
The media coverage tends to be very inflammatory, picking up on the little things and ignoring the bigger problems
ok, it's now starting to piss me off that evert motherfucking fun under the sun is being blamed on the actions of some kids. ok it is their faults no one else's, well maybe bad parenting. But Marilyn Manson did not walk into a colorado high school open fire and start throwing pipe bombs frickin everywhere. Neither did the exec's at ID. ok it was a couple of fucked up bastards who were missing a couple of circuts.
ok i am seen as wierd and hate most main stream crap. but i'm not going to kill anyone who has different opinions than me, i'll just ridicule the fuck out of them.
ok blah blah blah, every thing that these kids listened to played with watched or belived in is now the new antichrist for this society. But what if i walken into my dorm opend fire and blamed the backstreet boys and n'sync. would that work?
You move.
>Well, I thought that the most appropriate rebuttal would be to quote from the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Rights. So here goes.
Hmm. Yes, this is just the thing to stop school killings. A huge world government of 6-7 billiuon people to second guess the every action of a parent towards their child.
>There. I think that did it pretty well. And yes, I know that these are ideals, and that the US has a poor track record with them. But that's not the point.
I'm sure we have a better track record than most of the nations in the United Nations General Assembly. Not that any standard with the word "United Nations" in it is worth upholding, mind you.
Tanks, helicopters, etc. are good for obliterating people. They're not very good at CONTROLLING them. If you want to control an openly hostile populace, you'll need soldiers on the ground.
It is not hard to see that official attention is paid to an atrocity in direct proportion to the social status of its victims, and usually, its (immediate) perpetrators. [....] Uncaring parents and teasing by classmates notwithstanding, these two kids had a lot of advantages over most. If
the sickness of our society is beginning to get to them, how many more vulnerable people does it destroy?
But is that not the point of all the official attention? They shouldn't have gone bad--but they did. Why?
I don't see the link between self defense and killing another person... that has been culturally been bred into Americans. If no one had guns, non-lethal means of protection would work fine...
If no one had guns, that would be wonderful. Unfortunately guns exist, people own them, and will continue to own them if they are banned. There aren't many alternatives to keeping someone with a gun in check that don't involve having a gun yourself, or something more powerful.
Training like this used to be part of the school system in at least some places in the U.S., as early as elementary school. Many people would be extremely bothered if their kid was learning the same things today (how to protect yourself responsibly). This is likely part of the problem.
It amazes me how few people know about the US Gun Control laws.
In many US Cities, New York City, Los Angeles and San Francisco for examples, the issuance of permits to buy, own and carry concealed are "at the disgression" of the police.
This means that Senator (D) Diane Feinstein, while Mayor of SF, issued ONE and ONLY ONE permit, her own.
In NYC you had to be "connected" in some way to the Democrat Political Machine, find a politician slip him $500 and you got the permit. Al Capone, famous Chicago Import Export businessperson of the 1930's, had a NYC permit to carry a gun.
There is one aspect of this incident and others like it that is unchangeable--adolescent males are by nature more violent than other segments of human society. That's why sports and other outlets for violence are good, and easy access to weapons is bad. So, many adolescent males are going to react violently to certain situations--this can't be stopped. The nature of the reaction can be controlled though. Restrict access to deadly weapons to these violent males, and when they do decide to commit a violent act, it's a fight in the parking lot, not the murder of thirteen students in their school.
It's kind of scary reading through all these comments and realizing how close I might have been to buying some guns and taking out my high school on a suicide mission. I was one of those smart kids (top 5% of the class, would have been higher if I actually gave a damn during my last year) that never quite fit in. Looking back, my parents never really seemed to care that I was depressed and had no friends and they never taught me a damn thing about life. I know I shouldn't blame my parents for all my problems, but it's hard not to. In fact I'll admit my being raised Catholic and having a deep respect for human life was probably the only thing that kept me from carrying out my occasional suicidal tendencies to any serious conclusion.
I seem to agree with most of what the (higher rated) posts have had to say. Specifically that the media/advertising/entertainment industry is as much to blame as anything for this for deluding kids with the perception of life that sells the most stuff. The "haves" are popular, the "have nots" are outcasts. It's the popular people that ridicule and try to better themselves at the expense of the unpopular that are maladjusted, and not vice versa. Somone said that high school is a prison for anyone that doesn't fit in. I can agree with that. Someone else said that the hope of getting to college and getting a degree and getting a decent job while the football players pump gas may be the only thing that keeps someone going through high school. I can agree with that.
High school was, so far, the worst years of my life. My first eight months in college have only convinced me of this. Although for the first few months I continued being antisocial and took out my pent-up anger by being addicted to Quake... Eventually I came to realize that this was not high school. Intelligence is valued. People are interested in my opinion. People want to hear me talk. People want to be around me. I enjoy talking with and being around people. Well, that may be stretching the truth slightly since I am still a bit of a freak, but in general it's true. After four years of hell, I think I can honestly say I am, for the time being, happy. I'm still not sure what I want to do with my life, but I'm sure that will come. And I know college isn't the real world yet, but I'll deal with that when the time comes.
This is getting a bit long, so I might as well try and figure out what the point was. I guess that it's that if you're some suicidal, depressed, hopeless loser in high school only because you have some intelligence and refuse to buy clothes that make you a walking billboard - survive high school in whatever way you can, because life sure as hell can't get worse.
--- this comment is presented in WIDE SCREEN STEREO!!!
...and a few months back I went out and bought a black trenchcoat. :)
I don't think it means anything, really. I just always thought they looked cool.
--- this comment is presented in WIDE SCREEN STEREO!!!
Yes, after reading the diary of one of the killers, the media is finally getting at the high-school-is-hell causes for the massacre...
.
An article
--- this comment is presented in WIDE SCREEN STEREO!!!
Exactly. Couldn't have said it better myself. And the thing is, absolutes are bashed as the thing that _destroys_ American society, not builds up. American society as a whole claims that a relative view is what builds enlightenment. Relativism, in actuallity, claims that whatever anyone believes is right for _them_. So, according to popular cultural belief, this act of genocide was morally right for these guys to preform.
It is, once again, a result of declining morality in America in combination of the philosophy that man is evolving to something better. It invokes the mindset that, no matter what happens, man is getting better.
If you people believe in praying to God, the God spoken of in the Bible, I urge you to pray for our society, our government, and our president. Anyone can complain about something that is bad, but most don't have the mental discipline to do anything about it.
CAIMLAS
Relativism is the absolute belief that there are absolutely not absolutes.
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
I'm a HS senior. I had a semi-normal early childhood. People stopped talking to me around the third grade, I came home from school crying a lot. Middle school was awful. Nobody talked to me, this fat kid beat me up, and the only girl I could work up the courage to talk to treated me like I had ebola.
First two years of high school: I sat at a table alone (well, first half of freshman year there was a geek table, but all the geeks vanished for parts unknown) until I started to talk to people again towards the end of my junior year.
I have a place at a lunch table, but I still don't talk much. I sometimes ask myself why I bother. But I sit there, every day. I _should_ be at that table -- the valedictorian is there, the people who don't do drugs and try to succeed are there, but I don't belong. The other end of the cafeteria houses the delinquents, who listen to some of the same music, don't pull a shocked expression when I tell them that I got sloshed over the weekend, and won't slap me for swearing. (Figuratively. Physical violence is _so_ proletarian.) But I don't belong with them either.
I have a reputation for being clever, mostly because I do well on standardized testing. But I have weakness. Oh, the weakness. I'm meek as can be, but I pissed off the wrong people in March of my sophomore year. Luckily, they were a grade ahead of me, but a year and a half of constantly looking over my shoulder was enough to probably scar me for the forseeable future. I still get nervous when I'm on foot and hear a car approaching from behind. That time, a year and a half, was my personal darkest hour. The hick behind me in one class offered to buy me an assassin. (He's a habitual liar, of course, but that kind of thinking didn't enter into my mind.) I told him I wanted it. And that was my moment of weakness, my absolute lowest point.
If I had refrained from violence, it was from fear. Those two boys had no fear. They sensed their own doom and made the most of it.
I thought I sensed my own doom. But the troublemakers were shipped off to delinquent school. I have a girlfriend (I didn't see the point in it before, but it's the greatest damn thing in the world.) I have self-confidence. (Sort of. My people skills still aren't entirely up to snuff -- when I'm outgoing, it's forced. But at least I _want_ to be sociable.)
I can understand the hopelessness and abject pain those boys were in. And there were times when the only thing stopping me from violence was my own weakness.
I see an unspoken thread in the posts, and I say it here, aloud. I am not so different from those two boys. Insanity? A word to say 'hey, that's not me, never me.'
And the racism? There's not nice way to put this. Ethnic people (if you don't check 'white' on the survey card, you're ethnic) in my town are recvent immigrants. The vast majority live in the projects. And are poor. And have no future. And become bullies. It's a small leap to associate dark skin with that behavior when it's constantly reinforced.
And the slaying of people who were debatably innocent of the whole abuse-thing? Not to say that bully-murder should be legal, it just doesn't make any _sense_ to kill random people. Or does it? If the pain is so great that the entire world seems to be arrayed against you, is it that hard to understand?
It seems ridiculous to say this. I read the bios of the slain, I feel a pit in my stomach. But then I remember diving behind a hedge in terror two years ago, and I understand. If you haven't been there, you can't.
Whew. Personal. Yowch. I'm gonna go to sleep now. Mail if I seemed insightful.
-grendel drago
we sow the seeds of our own destruction.
be like me, read stupidmovies.
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
I am replying to this rediculus BS about making the owners of guns responsible for kids getting ahold of them. If there is some crazy @$$ Mother Fuc|er out there that is willing to go to school totin a nine and blow his classmates away, he could easily find a gun.
our sh!tty declining society is in fact the cause, there are no role models or values any more, no heroism or good. The media must be blamed, but the media is spawned from the society, and is a reflection of society. It is not media like Doom or Quake, I play them all the time, but I dont flip out and go wacko. It is the lack of morals in our society, Bill Clinton Bangin tha living H E double hockey stick out of all those women and getting off, there is no justice anymore.
when i was in high school, i once drew a picture of 'death' on the back of a quiz in chem, because i was debating a project i had to do for a cartooning class i had immediately after that..
and my luscious teacher turned me into the guidance office because of it, which i didnt appreciate terribly much.
i was asked several absurd questions that were literally 'do you or have you ever had violent or satanic[!] thoughts towards yourself and/or others'..
to me this was ludicrous, just because they had not even bothered to notice how innocent my intent in drawing things was. and actually made me feel considerably more alienated from the 'skewl community'.
i really dont know how i feel about probing people's personal lives being a good solution.. as someone mentioned before, it's much too accusatory and succeeds only at alienating people further.
as far as what you said about moral education in schools, it wouldnt have any effect when coming from possibly the very source that drove them to kill people in that very institution.
if there is to be any moral education in schools at all, it should be focused on making people realize that the consequences their chastising has on others are not trivial.
ok this is a stupid post. The fact will remain that the united states government does not really recognize people under the age of 18 as actual citizens. That is because they are under the charge of their parents/legal guardian.
This does not mean that they should be suspended in some orwellian society until the day they become full fledged "adults". Yeah discipline is important but it is not some magic ingredient that will singlularly prepare you for life.
As a parent you should realize that there may come a time when you need to violate your childs privacy, this should not be the norm only the responce to extreme situations.
Being a good parent involves a large amount of trust, invading your childs privacy will destroy this trust, thus degrading the parent child relationship. Extreme discretion should be used in any situation that might damage parent child relations. The childs safety, and the safety of those around him are more important than his/her privacy.
oh well i hope i made sense...
nickolas
Death is inevitable, but pain is only temporary
"If anything good can come from such a tragedy, it will be the liberal adults losing influence and the heavy hand of discipline lowering the boom
on all of those so called "young adults" in the US public schools."
Dicipline is good, but need not be heavy handed. I am a 17 year old third degree blackbelt, and the only thing on a daily basis that keeps me from killing people with my bare hands is dicipline and respect for other's. I don't chafe under this dicipline, or under others.
There is a reason for this. The dicipline that I live under is self imposed, and LEARNED though eight hard years of loving teaching. Not imposed by a horsewhip.
You can not impose dicipline in those who do not have it. You can only teach it.
Welcome to hell. I'm your friendly local guide.
This, to me, is one of the sad parts of this whole thing. It seems like everybody wants to point fingers. Many doing the pointing have no idea what they are talking about. The police of Columbine have even been criticized for not moving the SWAT team in fast enough, etc. WHOA!!! Take a step back. In the first place, does it set off any alarms in anyone's noggin that a SWAT Team should EVER have reason to enter a school where some police officer's own children attend school?
Folks, please--before lambasting the school and teachers, talk to some. Spend a couple of days with some in their classroom.
My wife is an Elementary School teacher, and she comes home frustrated more often than not. Sadly, many parents do not want to hear that their little darlings have a problem, and threaten the school with a lawsuit for harassment or some other such 90's nonsense. If you have a solution for that, please share it with us. I can think of one regarding the parents of the Columbine shooters, but it's nearly as bad as the problem we are all trying to come to grips with.
I CAN say that I got a really bad feeling watching the interview of Columbine's principal. I would not want to have been in his shoes, but he seemed to have absolutely NO CLUE what was going on in his school. He claimed that NOBODY wore trench coats in his school "It didn't happen." Does he never step foot out of his office?
But please, cut the teachers some slack. My wife busts her BUTT nights and weekends planning and preparing lesson plans and projects, writing reports, goals and evaluations. And she does this while also taking care of her own 7 year old son with severe asthma. She spent nearly $5000 of OUR money last year buying materials, supplies and props for her classroom. This is money above and beyond the paltry $700 budget she gets from the school, and in addition to donations from some very wise, understanding and generous parents. And still some parents are not satisfied.
Folks, before berating the education system, go spend a couple of days helping your kids' teachers. Ask if there is anything you can help with in the evenings such as cutting out objects with scissors, laminating things, making copies, etc.
If any teachers out there think I am off-base please respond and set me straight, but I would estimate that 8 out of 10 teachers are spending their own money to buy materials and supplies for your kid's classrooms. You can ask if there are any supplies you can donate, then go buy them. To avoid appearances of impropriety, don't offer money unless you go through channels. This can be done as well. One particularly grateful and very generous parent donated several thousand dollars to my wife's budget at the end of last year by going through the school board.
I will go so far as to say that if you haven't volunteered time to help out or even just to see what goes on, then you have no business criticizing because you are clueless.
I'm out
Your parents were just being parents. And THAT is one of the problems here. Too many people have gotten in the habit of finger-pointing, assigning responsibility, passing the buck... Too many parents think they can just neglect and abuse their kids and the school system should then undo every wrong anyone has ever done to them. It doesn't work that way. The schools were never intended to be surrogate parents, yet when the parents are not parents--who takes the first blows? The school.
Not all teachers and not all schools are prefect, but more often than not, it is the parents who fail their children as parents, than schools that fail to educate children.
...I hope that's sarcasm...
censorship is a form of noise, which actively seeks to drown out content with silence - Crash Culligan
Shall we also have hand control? What about making pipe illegal? Oh, and let's not forget the new legislation to make trenchcoats illegal as well. Legislation is not the answer. And, last I heard, pipe bombs and sawed-off shotguns _are_ illegal.
Next question: Did the Brady law or the waiting period or the registration or not allowing fellons to possess handguns help in this case??? Please explain how, exactly, "more gun control then it wouldn't have been so easy for these kids to get access to semi-automatic weapons."
censorship is a form of noise, which actively seeks to drown out content with silence - Crash Culligan
"I can't think of a single government agent being killed..."
You must not be thinking too hard...how many ATF folks died near an old farmhouse in Waco???
censorship is a form of noise, which actively seeks to drown out content with silence - Crash Culligan
"If these 2 kids' parent had gone "fascist" and
raided their bomb factory, there'd be 15 teenagers
still alive today in my hometown."
Um, the neighbors knew something was up. I've read that at least two different people in the neighborhood heard the kids building and breaking glass and such. So if the neighbors heard stuff, why didn't the parents? The parents didn't need to be fascist, they needed to go into their own garage. Again, not an invasion of privacy.
Maybe it ought to be 'if the parents had an ounce of brains to go into the garage and notice their kid was making a pipe-bomb, there'd be 14 teenagers and a teacher still alive today in my hometown'.
censorship is a form of noise, which actively seeks to drown out content with silence - Crash Culligan
"Actually, I never sugested making guns illegal, just large capacity magazines and assault weapons."
Aren't 'assault weapons' like semi-auto rifles already illegal? And, how do you make something like a Glock 9mm illegal when half the police forces in the country use them?
censorship is a form of noise, which actively seeks to drown out content with silence - Crash Culligan
Does that mean that my parents should have looked through all of my books? I read quite a bit of Tolkien when I was younger and those books deal very graphically with war in a fantasy land. Did I not have the right to read that? Should my parents have become suspicious whan I became fascinated with Rennaisance warfare? Maybe we should legislate weekly Child Checks, where parents go through everything in a kid's room and computer and remove everything 'objectionable'.
Hmmm?
#Asbestos suit ON
To a point, I have to blame the killers themselves. I'm really sorry they were 'persecuted'. So was I. I was discriminated against, spit on, beat up, ignored, taunted, made fun of, and generally in a much worse (IMO) situation then these two. Yet I have killed no one. Hell, I've never even been in a fist-fight (yet). And now our fine country is going to blame everyone and everything _but_ these two. That is the sick and twisted part.
censorship is a form of noise, which actively seeks to drown out content with silence - Crash Culligan
Good points, Lee. I think we really need to take a look at our educational system, because for all the talk about embracing diversity, multiculturalism, etc., there's still an awful lot of petty hate in high school directed at anyone different. I don't have any answers for this, obviously, except to share what helped me. I transferred from a large public school to a much smaller private school where all the teachers knew my name, and I knew all their names. At the time, this seemed like a horrible fate, but because of the smaller size and increased interaction the teachers had the time to get past my attitude and learn about who I really was. Also, I had to wear a uniform for several years, which I violently protested to my parents, but actually ended up liking. For one, I could sleep later each morning. Also, it eliminated snide comments like "nice shirt, loser" (seems minor, but it's much nicer to live without static like that) and forced me to find other ways to express my individuality like (gasp) sharing my opinions. Now, obviously, there was a lot more to my surviving adolescence than just these factors, and it was still no cakewalk. I was in and out of mental hospitals several times. Being female, I directed my rage at myself (as is most common in female adolescents). And I owe my parents an incredible debt of gratitude for their emotional and financial (private school ain't cheap) support. So, no answers here, just my 2 cents worth...
If you take guns from regular people, criminals will still have guns. The bombs are outlawed, but the kids had them. Prevention is the solution. Everybody saw the kids getting more crasy every day. No one did anything.
But what scares me most is that the gun industry to big is the US. It is simple if guns are produces, they are being sold to people, if they are being sold they are/will be used. Therefore, the guns are produced to be used.
I've read lots of great commentary in this discussion. Katz' article addressed some important points, and most of the rest of the points have been touched on by others. Certainly bad parenting (or even just lack of connection with their kids) was a factor. And it seems like most agree that readily accessible guns make it easier to commit such an act. In the end though, the question of what thread connects all of these school attacks remains. Namely, why do they all seem to happen in primarily white, suburban, middle class areas and involve male attackers of the same demographic?
Bad parenting is something that runs through all parts of American society, and there are bad parents in ever other country in the world. Guns are certainly much more easily available in America than Europe, for example, but that doesn't really explain the skew within America: guns are just as easily available in urban areas, and essentially to anyone who wants badly enough to obtain them. But white, suburban, males, perhaps more than other American teens, are subject to the harsh expectations and stereotypes imposed on them by American middle class values and social standards. The anger that the attackers in Littleton felt towards "jocks" and minorities seems to be a reaction towards those who ostracized and excluded them.
Middle class American society values athleticism and places expectations on young males to live up to a certain atheltic, macho standard. Failure to meet this standard is often met with expressions of disappointment and open degradation at the hands of families as well as peers. A more open and accepting society that doesn't impose such stringent expectations on teens is far less likely to have groups and cliques of teenagers so ostracized and socially disconnected that they turn to Naziism, racial hatred, and violence.
Ten years ago, was society so different? What has changed that made these school attacks increasingly common? In part, social isolation on the whole has grown, due to the media's increasing role, the internet and the increasing stress that modern life places on the family unit. This is not to say that any of these things MAKE people isolated, simply that they make it easier to withdraw if one wants to.
Of course, society can't just be magically changed. One could argue there's nothing we can do about it. But everyone can make an effort, by being an affirming, accepting, but firm and involved parent. But only through the slow process of societal evolution is this epidemic of schoolyard violence likely to end. Or, perhaps, we will prefer the patchwork solution of banning or strictly controlling gun sales. But this doesn't cure the ills, it just treats the symptoms. And it will inevitably be an imperfect fix.
I fully agree with what has been said on this thread so far. A parent does need to be at home with their children. The number of single parents in this nation is staggering, and I, for one, do not want to be involved in something like that. I am getting married in less than 4 months, and my wife are planning on having kids in the future (a few years from now). My wife is going to be an elementary school teacher, and when we have kids, she is going to quit working. This is by her own accord, she wants to be at home with the kids. Personally, I find this great, because I feel that is extremely important to a child's upbringing! Parents need to have a bigger role in their children's lives, and really show the kids that they love them!
Just my view.
They did play Vampire and listen to KMFDM, so you'd best get yourself ready for another round of "that old song and dance" after all. Already, news articles are talking about "German industrial music" and the music of a "German techno band." White Wolf (makers of Vampire) have issued a statement about how their books are always specific about being _just_a_game_ and don't encourage real supernatural experimentation or anything...
Sigh.
Josh
Well, although I disagree with the tone, I must
concur that when the adults think that the best
way to solve a problem is to perpetrate a naked
aggression against a sovereign state, they
should not be surprised that their children turn
to violence too.
Parent Another shooting In Tim-Buck-Two USA Mass murder with a semi What are you going to do the media say Ban all firearms the parents preach Burn a little bit of the constitution It's worth the breach We don't have time to watch our kids They say Take away the guns Our fore-fathers had no insight Protect our kids, we have no time. Another stabbing at school today A teacher dies by the hands of a kid Take away the sharp sticks They say And our problems will go away Sharp sticks are worthless They have no use Take them away And we promise They'll be no more abuse. We can't teach our kids What's right and wrong After all, we're too busy Someone was stoned to death today Kid on kid warfare with stones. Take away their slingshots! Take away their stones! They have no use They only break bones! I don't know where my kid Got the stones Make them illegal I don't talk to my kid I'm too busy, making ends meet. Parent choked to death today By his kids own hands What happened they say What a shame The parent didn't even talk to his kid Didn't know there was any trouble What do we do now The parents ask We can't ban anything more They'll just find another way Maybe, just maybe We should talk to our kids And then, our problems might go away...
SpamMan
I read today that someone has registered the .org .net and .com of trenchcoatmafia to prevent them from being exploited for commercial purposes.
He even turned down an offer for $20,000 for one of the domains...
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BlackNova Traders