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When I was younger tragedys like this never really bothered me much (that sounds cold, but you never really understand) but now I have my own son, and to think that somebody has rampaged through a school kiling children so young actually makes me sick and upset.

The anquish as a parent of thinking something this bad could/has happened to your child is enough to cripple you with emotion. Jesus if that was my sons school I would be terrified, in fact words could not describe how I would feel, god only knows what these parents are going through over there.

My heart really goe's out to them, and where I understand the relief some parents got when seeing their own child come out of the school alive, they should and everyone around the world should spare a thought for the other parents that have had their children cruel and unjustly taken away from them by this pathetic excuse of a human being.

No amount of condolences will ever take away the parents pain, we can all only pray that their suffering eases in time :(

From the UK to America, our thoughts are with you. May that sick b*****d rot in hell!!!!!!

NPR had a good piece on profiling and prevention on my way home from work today.

 Maelstrom808 wrote:

Tsilber wrote:
but how can you not lose a little faith in humanity after seeing something like this.

Because out of 300,000,000 or so people in the US, the number of people of people that have done something like this in the last 20 years would fit on a single school bus (which could then be set on fire and pushed off the nearest cliff).

Quoted for truth. The mental picture of a bus full of scum bags burning merrily is a wonderful mental picture.

Notice how knives are a far less efficient tool for killing people?

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia-pacific/2012/12/2012121481220620325.html

I don't think anyone is under the illusion you can legislate or regulate sick crazy feths out of existence, they’ve been around forever, but you can obviously reduce their ability to access efficient death machines.

Hey America, take a long hard fething look at your gun laws, because you seem to have a disproportionate amount of crazy sick feths… and they keep getting their hand on firearms.

Quark wrote:
This Modern World said it almost 2 years ago.

How many times does this comic need to get linked? The last time I saw it get posted relevantly (on another forum) was a whole 2 weeks ago.

Oh, and China was mentioned early on in this thread. Another school, another attacker. 22 wounded by a knife attack. 22 wounded vs 26 dead. I know which one I'd prefer.

September 18, 2001: The first of several letters laced with weaponized anthrax are delivered through the US postal system infecting 22 people, five of which die. No guns were used.

September 11, 2001: Terrorists flew three planes into building killing over 3000 people in total. No guns were used.

April 19, 1995: Timothy McVeigh drove a truck full of fertalizer into the basement of the Murrah Federal Building and detonated it killing 168 people, including 19 children under the age of 6. No guns were used.

February 26, 1993: Ramzi Yousef and his fellow conspirators detonated a bomb in the World Trade Center killing six people and injuring more than one thousand. No guns were used.

Are these are also preferable since no guns were used?

So you're going back at least 11 years to match what's happened twice in the past few months.

It's not about making killing go away - that's impossible. But to say we can't reduce it is disingenuous at best, and a lie at worst. Some of these people will find a way to kill, but it won't be as efficient at the job. Others are not so pre-planned, and getting past the deadly heat of the moment is much harder with a gun involved.

How would the incident with the Chiefs player have panned out if he had no gun?

April 19, 1995: Timothy McVeigh drove a truck full of fertalizer into the basement of the Murrah Federal Building and detonated it killing 168 people, including 19 children under the age of 6. No guns were used.

Woah. That many? I was watching a documentary about Neo-Nazism a couple weeks ago, and it mentioned that Mcveigh got his ideas from a guy, who was sort of a Nazi, who got his ideas from a sort-of-nazi, who got his ideas from a disciple of George Lincoln Rockwell. It just seemed like they were trying to place the blame on some sort of backwards racist philosophy, when in reality, McVeigh was just a nutbag, and while his philosophies may have escalated his actions, at the core, he was just insane.

Anyway, crazy people will always find horrible ways to kill people, Guns or not. Truth be told, I'm more worried about guns as an intimidation tool. You can make a person do anything if you put a gun in their face, or in the movies, in the small of their back. That's a scary thought.

 Breotan wrote:
[September 18, 2001: The first of several letters laced with weaponized anthrax are delivered through the US postal system infecting 22 people, five of which die. No guns were used.

Shortly therafter, the USPS installed biological detection systems to prevent that from happening again.

 Breotan wrote:
[September 11, 2001: Terrorists flew three planes into building killing over 3000 people in total. No guns were used.

Among many other things, airplane cockpit doors were hardened to prevent such an attack from recurring.

 Breotan wrote:
[April 19, 1995: Timothy McVeigh drove a truck full of fertalizer into the basement of the Murrah Federal Building and detonated it killing 168 people, including 19 children under the age of 6. No guns were used.

After this happened, large fertilizer purchases began being tracked, and suspicious ones investigated by the FBI.

 Breotan wrote:
[February 26, 1993: Ramzi Yousef and his fellow conspirators detonated a bomb in the World Trade Center killing six people and injuring more than one thousand. No guns were used.

After this happened, truck barriers were installed at sensitive locations to prevent this from recurring.


We can never stop madmen from engaging in mass murder, but we could at least try to find ways to prevent them from doing the same sort of thing over and over again. All of these major attacks were addressed in some way. We don't even try with gun violence, not in any meaningful way. I don't know exactly what the answer is, but we should stop pretending this isn't actually a problem.

Another one of these, huh? I'm getting tired of hearing about lone gunmen and their homicidal rampages.

Quark wrote:
.

How would the incident with the Chiefs player have panned out if he had no gun?

He probably would have beaten his girlfriend to death and jumped into the Potomach.

Don't call me cruel, because this is very bad, I'm not saying it isn't, but I think the media should stop latching on to stories like this. It desensitises us to violence and horrific acts like this if we hear about them all the time. It could give other nutcases ideas. Finally, can you imagine what the parents or loved ones of the dead think of all the coverage?

Also, gun laws need to be ramped up. If a country is going to allow guns, then very strict regulations need to put upon them. Someone owning a gun would need to have a background check. Only specially licensed shops should sell them, and there should not be many of them. The idea of selling guns in hypermarkets is ridiculous! A person should only be allowed to own one gun and a limited amount of ammunition. Finally, only small handguns should be sold.

That's my 2 cents, I'm not sure if it would work, but there you go.

 ExNoctemNacimur wrote:
Don't call me cruel, because this is very bad, I'm not saying it isn't, but I think the media should stop latching on to stories like this. It desensitises us to violence and horrific acts like this if we hear about them all the time. It could give other nutcases ideas. Finally, can you imagine what the parents or loved ones of the dead think of all the coverage?

Also, gun laws need to be ramped up. If a country is going to allow guns, then very strict regulations need to put upon them. Someone owning a gun would need to have a background check. Only specially licensed shops should sell them, and there should not be many of them. The idea of selling guns in hypermarkets is ridiculous! A person should only be allowed to own one gun and a limited amount of ammunition. Finally, only small handguns should be sold.

That's my 2 cents, I'm not sure if it would work, but there you go.

-he didn't buy the guns, so no background checks would have shown anything
-the person that purchased the guns passed all background checks and it seems like there was no reason why she shouldn't have
-he killed everyone using small handgun
-if somebody buys small amounts of ammo over a period of time they would still have a bunch

None of the suggestions would have made a difference.

According to BBC:
These included two handguns - a Glock and a Sig Sauer - and a .223-calibre rifle, reports said.

Whether he used it or not is irrelevant - he still had it.

Someone would have bought the guns that did the shooting.

I'll clarify my ammo point - a person should only have a limited amount of ammo. Whether s/he buys it all in one go or in several goes does not matter - s/he is only allowed a small amount of ammunition.

Whilst it's too late, the suggestions I made could prevent further shootings like htis.

Having the rifle doesn't matter since of was left in the car, was not used, and didn't kill a single person.

He still had it and may have had plans to use it. We won't know. Do you not think it seems stupid to have a random rifle in the boot of your car?

d-usa wrote:

 KalashnikovMarine wrote:

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:
Apparently some guy posted on 4chan that he was going to kill himself in Connecticut today and that it'd "make the news".

Link is not safe for anywhere:

Spoiler:

http://i.imgur.com/l9ru5.jpg

Holy

That's pretty scary.

I'm calling hoax on that.

1) There is no URL in the screenshot.
2) This was posted on Wednesday, and if I know 4chan it would have dropped off well before Friday.
3) I admit that I don't know that much about 4chan, but the quote/reference number asking the OP "where?" doesn't point back to the OP.
4) There are so many "Ima kill everyone" threads on 4chan, what is the chance that somebody just screenshots them all before they drop off?

Of course I could be wrong, but I find it more likely that 4chan is twisted enough to joke about somebody posting that instead of this being real...

This isn't even all that rare for 4chan. I think this is like the 4 th mass shooting spree that has been announced on /b/, and something like the 8 or 9th murder? It usually gets a couple a year. And in counterpoint.

1.) Looks like the screen cap was taken with the 4chan mobile phone app, url not necessarily onscreen unless thumbed for.
2.) Threads advertising someones impending an hero are often capped and saved by anons in the event that OP actually delivers.
3.) That's a byproduct of the phone app.
4.) This is pretty much what happens. There have been corroborating screen caps for OP's delivering of the goods dating back 4 years. That's the longest I personally know of.

MrMerlin wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

 MrMerlin wrote:

Experiment 626 wrote:


Saying 'ban guns from crazy peaople' is just as effective as Toronto City Council trying to ban the sale of all bullets within city limits after the Eaton Center mass shooting or the Danzig Streetparty mass shooting.

Yet banning guns from crazy people seems to work really well in Europe....

Not in Norway.

That guy in norway was not just some mad lunatic who went on a killing spree for the fun of it, he was a terrorist. That is a completely different thing... terrorists will nearly always get their intsruments of mass destruction from somwhere.
I was talking about nutjobs who feel a "sudden" urge to kill, and only have to go to the next street corner to buy a gun

The only state I know of that doesn't require a mental health background check is Georgia. And I'm not even 100% sure on that.

That said, it's not that these people are crazy and have access to guns, it's the culture in which these people live in. Europe has a different culture, Canada has a different culture, America's culture for one reason or another just results in more mass shooters than anyother first world nation. Even though there are several nations/populations that have a gun ownership level roughly equal to that of the United States.

Bongo_clive wrote:Hmmm, to cling to a law created when guns could fire 3 rounds a minute seems a little obtuse.

Obviously the gun itself is not to blame, and the classic argument is about cars causing lots of deaths, so why not ban driving, but last time I drove, there were a BOLLOCK load of rules about where, when and how I could drive. these rules seem to be lacking in the realm of gun ownership

There are so many rules in the realm of gun ownership. The thing is though that they aren't frequently broken, but when they are people have a tendency, to, you know, get shot.

 ExNoctemNacimur wrote:
It desensitises us to violence and horrific acts like this if we hear about them all the time.

If the actions are ignored, then the result is the same.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 d-usa wrote:
Having the rifle doesn't matter since of was left in the car, was not used, and didn't kill a single person.

It doesn't matter either way because in this case, as with most cases of shooting in places assumed to be safe, the handguns were more than sufficient.

 ExNoctemNacimur wrote:
According to BBC:
These included two handguns - a Glock and a Sig Sauer - and a .223-calibre rifle, reports said.

Whether he used it or not is irrelevant - he still had it.

Someone would have bought the guns that did the shooting.

I'll clarify my ammo point - a person should only have a limited amount of ammo. Whether s/he buys it all in one go or in several goes does not matter - s/he is only allowed a small amount of ammunition.

Whilst it's too late, the suggestions I made could prevent further shootings like htis.

Amount of total ammunition, while certainly a factor, is generally not the main one when it comes to the capability of a weapon to kill large groups of people. It's all about magazine size, cyclic rate, and magazine reload rate, followed by round type.

In Canada we have magazine restrictions. No Semi-Auto Longbarreled fire arm can have a magazine that holds more than 4-5 rounds. (with the exception of .22 calibre rifles) and shotguns are not allowed to have a magazine size capable of loading more than 4 shells. Though that's usually done through the use of plugs, and the only way they check is take your gun and cycle it 4 times.

The only mass shootings I can think of right now that were both done with legally purchased firearms had been illegally loaded.

It's not the guns, or the "gun culture" that does this...

Its a disturbed individual did this.

 whembly wrote:
It's not the guns, or the "gun culture" that does this...

Its a disturbed individual did this.

It isn't just gun culture, that's true, but there is definitely a cultural component to the high rate of violent crime in the US (with or without guns), but that's for another thread.

There are more legally owned guns in the United States than pretty much all the militaries in all the countries of all the world. I've heard figures ranging from 160-300 million guns in private ownership.

Whether you believe in gun control or not, Pandora's box is already open and you can't close it again. Even if you stopped selling guns today, you'd still have these shootings for years. If you attempted to confiscate the guns, you'd have death on a scale that would make 9/11 look like a walk in the park.

There are a lot of reasons I believe you have these mass shootings. Mental illness going unreported is one. Medicating mental health symptoms instead of treating the root causes is another. A society that has promoted maximalist positions and a me first attitude is a huge part of our problem. We've raised our children to believe that they are a unique snowflake and that their feelings and issues are valuable and important. However, we've not really given them the skills to cope with these feelings.

These young, anti-social, and often sociopathic young men are usually ostracized by their peers, ignored by their parents, and have been raised in a society that tells them that "men" suck it up and deal with their own problems. When these kids don't have the tools to deal with their problems in a civilized way, they turn to their baser instincts and make those that have hurt them (or just society at large) pay for their pain.

Quark wrote:
So you're going back at least 11 years to match what's happened twice in the past few months.

It's not about making killing go away - that's impossible. But to say we can't reduce it is disingenuous at best, and a lie at worst. Some of these people will find a way to kill, but it won't be as efficient at the job. Others are not so pre-planned, and getting past the deadly heat of the moment is much harder with a gun involved.

How would the incident with the Chiefs player have panned out if he had no gun?

How many people were killed by drunk drivers in the past few months? I say we ban alcohol or limit how many bottles someone can buy in a set time span.

InquisitorVaron wrote:
Still guns should be given out stricter and automatic weapons banned.
That and made illegal to take off your premises unless in a safe box.

Until you can fit these nutters on one hand you've not done enough.

You think I can walk into my local shop and pick up an automatic weapon?

I've never understood why firm gun control advocates never bother to learn all that much about the actual state of firearm sales in this country, not to mention a little more about what it is they're trying to ban. An AR-15 needs to go, but an M-14 clone is A-OK because, as far as they can tell, it doesn't look as scary?

This is so deeply messed up I don't know where to begin.


http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/potential_connecticut_school_shooting_8HMOSbP38TXwSYYsVGkYLO

In this story's opening paragraphs it states how the shooters mother teaches at the school and is highly regarded there.
It also states that she was killed at home and that her son has some sort of "dispute" with her.
The shooters brother has told police that the shooter was Autistic.

It makes me wonder if he killed his mother first at home and then went to her kindergarten class to kill what she cared so much about, her precious students.

The United States has dismantled so much of its former mental health system because of abuses of care, but we clearly are not doing enough to help manage and get support for people with these different mental and behavioral health needs.

This is such a major tragedy, I don't even have words to describe how I feel. I have daughters that age and would be destroyed if that had happened to them.

Ratbarf wrote:The only state I know of that doesn't require a mental health background check is Georgia.

Bull Gak

Other than the state of Fantasy none of them require a "mental health background check"
And the funny thing about the only background check they do, the NICS, is that its national.

Mental health background check? For what? Where? Is that a Canadian flag?

 AustonT wrote:

Ratbarf wrote:The only state I know of that doesn't require a mental health background check is Georgia.

Bull Gak

Other than the state of Fantasy none of them require a "mental health background check"
And the funny thing about the only background check they do, the NICS, is that its national.

I think maybe he is talking about states requiring that mental health issues be reported? I don't think that they are required to report in Oklahoma other than court ordered mental health actions.

Be reported to who?

 Manchu wrote:
Be reported to who?

The FBI.
Reporting is hardly a background check. And what does and doesn't actually show up on NCIS is like a Magic 8 ball.

Do you have a history of mental illness?
FBI: Signs point to No