Atrocities

[catwhowalksbyhimself]

Yes, they are complicated and difficult to understand.

But I will say this:  When there are no consequences nor anything to fear, people will be willing to do all manner of things they normally didn't.  When one is planning to die anyway, there are no consequences to any actions that one might take.  It is no coincidence that these attrocities are all murder-suicides.

[detourne_me]

ugh, i just woke up.  why did i decide to read this thread? :wacko:

in other news:
[spoiler]
dog loves to shred!
I wish just sometimes the media would gloss over bad stories with tales of such unexpected joy...[/spoiler]

[Tomato]

Prem/Prev brought up this thread or some shooting insanity(admittedly I neithor checked that article or this one), and despite my moral aversion to these types of discussions, I'll post anyway, because I'm waiting for my laptop to format and reinstall windows and I'm bored and this was on the recent posts thing a few minutes ago.

I have not read this article, I do not intend to read this article, and I would encourage others not to read this article. Invariably it's always the same type of stupid loser who decided he wanted to die, but that it would be cool to take people with him. Why? Because people will then care about his life.

Oh, and what inevitably do we find? It's always some loser who lost his girlfriend or decided he wanted to be a religious nutso and killed others for media attention. And guess what? Because we care, he wins. And not only does he win, the next loser who decides he wants to commit suicide because his girlfriend dumped him or wants to prove a pointgets the genius idea to take people out with him because lord knows, the media will cover it.


The idiot behind it is dead, and he died as he lived... a moron. The best way to punish him for his stupidity is to MOVE ON and forget this ever happened.

[stumpy]

Folks, we're trying to let this thread remain unlocked, but when we get to the point of making specific policy recommendations in controversial areas, there will be no way to avoid crossing the line on a topic that is already very near it for two of our restricted subjects.

Let's be careful.

[TheMarvell]

god, 3 major public shootings in the last week. First the Westroads mall shooting (in my own home city no-less. Shopping there will never be the same for me), then this shooting at a church, and now the latest one: some arse decides to shoot high school kids coming off a school bus :

http://omaha.cox.net/cci/newsnational/national?_mode=view&_state=maximized&view=article&id=D8TFME6G0&_action=validatearticle

You can't compare these kinds of deaths to the ones in Iraq. While both are unjustified, the ones in Iraq are at least expected. Kids coming off a school bus, or studying in a church, or shopping at the mall are places people should not be getting shot and killed.

This sucks.  :(

[lugaru]

god, 3 major public shootings in the last week. First the Westroads mall shooting (in my own home city no-less. Shopping there will never be the same for me), then this shooting at a church, and now the latest one: some arse decides to shoot high school kids coming off a school bus :

http://omaha.cox.net/cci/newsnational/national?_mode=view&_state=maximized&view=article&id=D8TFME6G0&_action=validatearticle

You can't compare these kinds of deaths to the ones in Iraq. While both are unjustified, the ones in Iraq are at least expected. Kids coming off a school bus, or studying in a church, or shopping at the mall are places people should not be getting shot and killed.

This sucks.  :(

I dont want to sidetrack things but I consider this sort of distinction a problem. Recently the Weekly Dig posted a good article in their media critizism section about how this contractor beat a client to death in the suburbs and how it was huge, major news. The same night a kid had shot a pizza store owner in Dorchester (ill reputed neighborhood in Boston) during a robbery and it went uncovered. It wasent a matter of race (the shop owner was a Russian immigrant) so much as a matter of expectations. People thing we dont need to talk about urban violence because urban violence is inevitable, it is expected. Suburb violence on the other hand is shocking, because these people pay good money to get out of the 'dangerous city' that everybody refuses to talk about because it is considered a given that the violence cannot be stopped. Likewise Irak... we are completely insensitive to the violence because we expect people to get killed, but we arent talking about how to stop this or why it is happening in the first place. Nobody cares... it's not the suburbs.

[BentonGrey]

Lugaru, what makes things like these shootings so shocking, and therefore of greater concern to us, is not that the victims are white, or that it happens in a suburb or such (although I understand the point you're making about the news, and I wholeheartedly agree with you), but when someone sets out to kill, not for money, not for gain, but because they want to be remembered, or because they hate people of a faith.......well, that is incredibly disturbing.  These things we (incredibly sadly) expect from wack jobs in the Middle East or Indonesia, but not here in our own back yard.  These things are so disturbing because they are just so far beyond comprehension.  A man gets shot in a robbery gone bad....it's terrible, but you understand the motive, greed.  Who of us can understand what the heck is wrong with these people?

[MJB]

Locking this before someone else lowers the boom.

Thanks for trying to keep it civil guys. :)

-MJB