I read in Polycarp’s thread that no one has responded to you.
Check this CBC cite out .
The NRA are gonna love this !
Since 1966 there have been 7 school shooting in the US. In Canada there have been 9. Keep in mind that the US has 10 times the population . Keep in mind we have some serious gun control.
The cite does refer to the listed incidents as “prominent” shootings and only references 3 others in Scotland, Russia , and Germany, but let me tell you that I am completely taken by surprize.
Just who did I foist the responsibility onto? Why should every trajedy require irresponsibility on someone’s part ?
The news says the school will reopen in a week and that there will be a heavy police presence. Why? Do they think he will get out and do it again. ?
I’m sure that’s more to ease people’s minds than it is to actually prevent anything.
I’m not sure how I feel counting the shooter as a victim, but I sure feel bad for his family. Even if he had some mental issues, they did try and get him treatment, he WAS on meds that he chose to give up, and parental responsibility only can go so far with a 27 year old.
It’s the same reaction that all governments are limited to. The cops, the fire department, all of the alphabet rangers (FBI, DEA etc.) are REactive forces, which means that they wait for something to happen, THEN respond to it. Though SOME departments do SOME proactive things, for most it’s a dog and pony show meant to drum up public interest, and honestly, no force is large enough, well paid enough, or well equipped enough to be truly proactive in the defense of the citizenry. This is just an exercise in trying to calm and reassure the public, nothing more.
Honestly, it’s up to each and every one of us to look out for ourselves, and to stop the people we elect from taking that right away from us. Even if it wasn’t a gun, if some courageous student with a taser could have intervened, this may have been a completely different scenario. The facts are that you can’t prevent these kinds of things from happening completely, you CAN attempt to mitigate the outcome. You can better fund mental health programs, you can do screenings, you can metal detector and scan everyone and everything that goes into public places, but like it or not, the more people you have with the ability to defend themselves, the fewer are likely to die at the hands of some whackjob that goes off his meds and skips his scooter.
Mr. Bus Guy, I’m very glad that your daughter is OK, you both were fortunate.
As far as treating the offender as a victim, well, that, IMO is a heaping dose of unadulterated crap. He is the offender, he is not a victim. He is a killer, and no matter what drove him to it, his actions were his own, and frankly, I’m glad he’s dead, so that we (as both taxpayers and citizens) don’t have to be a party to the trial. Just one fellas opinion though.
That’s putting it mildly.
What are you on? Of course CBC, a Canadian broadcaster, would provide a more extensive list of school shootings in Canada than those in the US. That doesn’t mean that school shootings in Canada are more common than in the United States.
Here is an incomplete list of school shootings in the US since 1966 with at least fifty entries.
Fixed your link.
I didn’t check all the links, but your list includes the Kent State shooting by the national guard so the criteria for listing is somewhat different. Not that I dismiss your point, but even at 50, The US has to come up with 90 to be comparable to Canada. That still suggests thart the gun control issue (and I do vehemently support gun control) isn’t a factor in school shootings.
The Chicago Police Department, as a whole, have historically been for stricter gun control for practical reasons. I can’t say with any sort of authority on whether individual officers as a whole are pro- or against gun control. From my experience, I’ve known probably slightly more against general gun ownership than pro, but it’s close to 50-50.
I definitely think less guns = less violence, but I think it’s too late for the US, there’s too much of an easily accessible illicit market, and gun ownership rights are too engrained in our culture to change it. So I generally end up siding pro-responsible gun ownership.
But studies have shown that to be incorrect. The fact that you’re in Illinois, a state with some of the most draconian restrictions on firearms, yet things like this happen, should also serve to convince you otherwise.
I wish I could say you were right. I know a list was just posted, but this one in particular got press.
Have they? Show me some stuff. I’m genuinely curious. I have no horse in this race: I grew up with guns in the house, my college roommate had a gun (illegally) in our apartment, and I’ve been out shooting, so I have nothing against them in theory. The last chart I remember reading–and this was not in the context of a gun debate, I was just looking up some numbers on Finnish and Swiss gun ownership–shows pretty much a linear relationship between a (first-world) country’s per capita occurance of firearms deaths with the percentage of households owning a gun.
edit: I should add, I don’t want to hijack this thread into a gun debate, either, so just give me that cite and should I feel to continue this further, I suppose I can open a debate somewhere, or continue one in an already extant thread (I’m sure there must be one in GD).
Yeah, but. Let his dad grieve. He still lost his son and only child; doesn’t matter how.
Of course, his father should be allowed to grieve, no one with an ounce of humanity would deny him that, but the fact remains that the legacy his son left is a muderous one. He, the shooter I mean, should simply not be counted among the victims of thi tragedy. History, and indeed society, should see him as the cause of it. Feeling bad for his father is one thing, but he should be spared not an ounce of pity, at least as far as I am concerned.
The shooter had a girlfriend. :rolleyes: 
Right here in our own backyard (or front yard, depending on where you are) is This Data. The gents’ name is John Lott. Do with it what you will.
I think it’s a bit more complicated than that. Admitting that random person x was the only thing causal is also admitting that our own personal destiny isn’t entirely under our own control - and THAT thought really terrifies a lot of people. Too many people in our society have a strong psychological need to believe that life is totally controllable (even though that is obviously completely untrue).
(I’m reminded of the comments I read online after Linda McCarthy died of breast cancer and Dana Reeve of lung cancer. “But she was a vegan! She worked out! She didn’t smoke!” So? Whoever said leading a healthy lifestyle would be a total shield from cancer? All it is is an attempt to weight the dice in your favor. But to a lot of people, those deaths seemed in an odd way not be merely tragic, but somehow unjust, as though the Universe owed Ms. McCarthy and Ms. Reeve a longer life because they went to a greater effort to take care of their bodies than most of us do. Sorry, folks, but the Universe just doesn’t work that way.)
Just a note, but if you ever look up serial killers, one of their favorite ways to kill people is to go driving out in the middle of nowhere and hit anyone walking alongside the road.
Finding a way to kill multiple people, minus a gun, isn’t difficult. Vehicle, poison, date-rape drug + knife, hiring prostitutes + knife, etc.
I don’t know if I’ve ever been quite so off the mark in an assumption. Thanks.