Did you go to lots of raves and take X when you were younger? No?
Maybe it’s because you were not a teen recently, and are not a teen currently. Not modern. Things do change.
I guess I should clarify my statement so that dnooman doesn’t get confused.
See, teens have been pushing the envelope since before you and I were teens. But theirs, our our parents did this amazing thing called parenting. It means that you check who your kids’ friends are, you check where they’re going. If they’re supposed to be home you look in on them to make sure they’re in their bed (and not two pillows and a manniquin’s head).
If they screw up, they get grounded, as in, no MONEY. Kinda hard to party without funding. Friends aren’t going to foot the bill for other teens’ partying for long (the few that can afford it).
And last, and first and foremost on the importance list, you give your kids, (starting way before pre-teenhood), a solid foundation on which to build the self-assurance and confidence to make reasonably decent judgment calls. Yes, yes…sometimes that will fail. But parents aren’t put here to be a kid’s buddy (as in the dad in the OP who allowed his 14 year old to party), we’re put here to do our job of raising a decent productive member of society.
You said “Modern teens” as if they invented the desire to break free, party, have fun, get beer. You say “modern teens” as if they are doing something so different from all the teens that came before. Please.
The only thing that has changed is the drug du jour, the causes du jour and that the modern teens have such crappy music by which to party. Human nature hasn’t changed. Only the scenery has.
…and people still go on pointless murderous rampages. No amount of parenting can prevent some psycho from going postal and shooting people, except maybe the shooter’s parents.
If raves are such breeding grounds for mass murders, perhaps someone can cite a few of them?
I still think parents should not let their kids go to unsupervised raves and such, but there is nothing that could have prevented that guy from killing people short of killing him first. If the rave were supervised, would the chaperones be armed?
The fault for the deaths lies squarely on the shooter’s shoulders (and perhaps those of his parents).
I’m not sure who it is that you’re replying to, but for me, I certainly didn’t state anything regarding whose fault it was.
My point was, that reasonably good parenting (Yes, I realize, NO parent can foresee everything, be perfect and protect their children from any and all harm), includes not allowing your children to go to places that are inherently unsafe. Which a party designed for teens to suck up drugs and alcohol certainly is. If only for the dangers of overdosing, and as someone mentioned above, rape or other assault from other, more unsavory partygoers.
No one really expects a psycho gunman to pop up and shoot up an X lovefest. But an informed and on the ball parent SHOULD understand the dangers of the modern drugs and be on guard for situations that are unsafe for his/her kid regarding that situation alone.
Stating “parents have some responsibility in this” does NOT then equal “it’s their fault they died”.
CanvasShoes I don’t disagree with anything you’ve said. Most of us are probably on the same page as far as what parent should and should not let their kids do.
But,
seems to lean more towards “it’s their fault” than “they have some responsibility” to me. Hence my moment of anger.
The last thing that the parents of the slain kids need to hear is that they should have known better.
You know what’s sad? Christopher Williamson, one of the kids who was killed, kept a livejournal. His last entry was:
You know what’s sadder?
The entry before that. 
Right. One designed to evince emotion and short-circuit objectivity and incite anger.
If three hundred rounds and two guns is “armed to the teeth,” then I’m often “armed to the teeth.” Pretty much every time I go to the gun club I have that, and much more, in my car.
Would you be equally glad if someone attending the party, say the homeowner, had pulled out a gun and shot the guy?
It is a sign that you have intention to fire a significant percentage of those bullets in the near future. If your intention was to fire them at people ( in home deffence, war or murder) then “armed to the teeth” isn’t such an unreasonable turn of phraise. A gun in each hand and bullets to spare is armed to the teeth IMHO. And yes every cop car in america is armed to the teeth.
Very happy. I looked at the article before it was on Straight Dope hoping to find this was the case, so I could start a thread about how home ownership of guns had saved lives.
Good enough, Bippy. You and I may disagree a little bit about the quantification of “armed to the teeth,” but that’s rather immaterial, I suppose.
I should note that when I made my comment about the guy being shot by the homeowner, I neglected to take into consideration your qualifications about him taking his own life. Had I fully considered those, I wouldn’t have asked my question; your answer would likely have been quite easily and accurately inferred. When the whole mess is taken in that light, I believe you and I are in substantial agreement. I’d have been less happy with him taking his own life if the alternative was to simply surrender to the cops. A much different thing than taking hostages or engaging in a shootout with the cops.
OT musing… about “Armed to the Teeth”
How many guns, and of what type does an average member of the US Infantry carry on him during active duty in a potentially dangerous situation?
I don’t have any authoritative knowledge, and I should probably wait for someone who does, but at minimum the infantry guy’s got a select-fire M-16 rifle, plus bayonet. Maybe with an M203 grenade launcher on it. Dunno about a side-arm, but probably not, but it’d likely be a Beretta M9 9mm semi-auto as those have been going into service for at least a decade to replace the old M1911A1 .45ACPs. There’d almost certainly be a guy or two in each squad with an M-249.
So one or two guns is reasonable number to have on ones person when in a war zone. Is there ever a real reason to have more guns on ones person in a combat situation? I can guess if a gun jams a backup is useful, and that a side arm is useful in addition to a main rifle or shotgun.
SOL this time, dude. What private gun ownership did in this particular case was definitely not saving lives.
Mind you, I support the principle of private gun ownership, if reasonably regulated (and we can argue about what constitutes “reasonable regulation”). And I’m willing to tolerate even the statistical inevitability of occasional tragedies like this one as a consequence, because I think that a certain amount of private gun ownership in a country like the US is still defensible on grounds of long-established tradition and common sense.
But I do get a little irritated by Pollyanna gun advocates who relentlessly keep trying to spin the gun ownership issue as unqualifiedly positive. “Armed madman shoots people + Somebody shoots armed madman = Guns save lives”. Bull. Private gun ownership has its dangers and disadvantages as well as its advantages. And a case like this one is a clear example of the disadvantages, like it or not.
(And you can spare me the relentlessly upbeat hypotheticals about how if only there had been more gun ownership involved—i.e., somebody else shooting the assailant—the situation would have been better and lives would have been saved. Sometimes it works out that way, and sometimes it doesn’t.)
I’ve got to disagree with this.
It actually reminds me of a thread from a little while back about some kids (in FL maybe) who were driving underage and got killed by a semi (who was at fault).
My opinion here is the same as it was there. The fact that a loon killed a bunch of people at a place the victims happened to be at does not mean that those who let the victims go there are responsible for this. It’s an event that could have happened anywhere, and whether or not you feel the parents should have allowed their teens to go to this party, being shot is not a consequence of that decision that I would hold the parents accountable for even having thought of.
If some specificly rave-related calamity had occured then I might agree with you. This however, is simply a case of wrong place, wrong time circumstances.
I’m 34, went to raves when I lived in Hollywood back in the early 90’s, I was 19 when I went to my first, and X wasn’t even the most dangerous of the drugs I was experimenting with back in those days, so I think that would count as a yes, in answer to your question.
“Modern” teens still aren’t really doing anything worse or different than we were as teens, although I do hold the opinion that for whatever reason they seem to be by and large, doing it earlier…admittedly, I was a late bloomer, so my experience may be a bit skewed on the early end, but I assure you I was a full-blown hellion by 16.
I don’t think the parents should be held responsible legally, and obviously it’s not really anyone’s fault but the shooter’s she’s dead…but I’ve got to say, the first thing that came to mind when I read the article was “what the fuck kind of parents give their 14 year old daughters permission to go to raves till 3 AM?!?”.
I almost exclusively use a .303 when I’m out hunting, regardless of whether I’m going after Hares, Foxes, Pigs, or Deer- but then, it’s quite likely I might encounter one or more of those game on a trip and it’s simply too much extra weight and hassle to carry a “smaller” rifle. But no, I don’t carry 300 rounds of ammo with me- most I’ve ever taken was 100 rounds.
Still, this guy was obviously a fruitloop, but it depends what calibre of ammunition the 300 rounds was- a brick of .22 ammunition is 500 rounds, and that doesn’t take very long at all to shoot off in competitions and practicing.
As someone far wiser than myself once said in response to a suggestion ammunition sales should be limited to certain quantities:
“50 rounds of ammunition isn’t anything like enough for most competition and practice shoots, but it would be enough for one of the biggest shooting sprees in history if every single shot hit and killed someone.” (Any shooter will tell you that no-one is that good a shot outside the movies, at least not without specialised target rifles at a shooting range under controlled and ideal conditions)
I feel sorry for the parents in this case, but if I had a 14 year old daughter the LAST thing I’d be letting her do is go to raves… surely they must know about the drugs and sex and other generally not-suitable-for-14yo-girls stuff that goes on there?