# "Whites don't kill whites..." Shooting at Kentucky Kroger supermarket **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [October 25, 2018, 1:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496 "2018-10-25T13:53:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2018, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/61 "2018-10-26T15:04:25Z")
> [@Jack\_Batty](#): > > Isn’t amazing how someone who exhibits blatant racist behavior, threatens racial violence and then perpetrates the racial violence he’s threatened to do always turns out to be just mentally ill and not violently racist after all? Who’s saying he’s not violently racist? It’s not as though “mentally ill” and “violently racist” are mutually exclusive. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2018, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/62 "2018-10-26T15:06:46Z")
Turns out the shooter [tried to enter a black church](https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/26/us/kentucky-kroger-shooting/index.html) minutes before the shooting. No, nothing racial about this shooting at all. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2018, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/63 "2018-10-26T15:59:19Z")
Who is claiming that there is nothing racial about the shooting? Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![PackerMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f17d59/32.png) [@PackerMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PackerMan)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2018, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/64 "2018-10-26T18:04:13Z")
> [@TommyzNR](#): > > I get that, but you put it in quotes. In English that tells the reader that he said it rather than the fact that the author implied it from the story. Where does that leave Asians and Hispanics, etc. > > Is there a symbol for air quotes? What about the Vietnamese? I’m definitely fighting with the blacks if they’ve got the Vietnamese. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2018, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/65 "2018-10-26T22:04:34Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > Here are the gun ownership rates, per 100 inhabitants, of the five countries which lead the world in a weighted sum of homicidal and accidental gun deaths: > Venezuela 11 > Guatemala 13 > Paraguay 17 > Uruguay 32 > U.S.A. 89 > (Serbia is in a distant 2nd place with 38 guns per 100 inhabitants.) [Cite.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_firearm-related_death_rate) > > U.S.A.'s gun culture is not “unique”? To the country, U.S.A. wears that distinctly proudly. > [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > “guns per 100 inhabitants” is a stupid metric. Sorry. Do you like one of these better? Guns per million inhabitants Venezuela 110,000 Guatemala 130,000 Paraguay 170,000 Uruguay 320,000 U.S.A. 890,000 Guns per 31.4 inhabitants Venezuela 3.5 Guatemala 4.1 Paraguay 5.3 Uruguay 10 U.S.A. 28 ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2018, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/66 "2018-10-26T22:20:01Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > Sorry. Do you like one of these better? > Guns per million inhabitants > Venezuela 110,000 > Guatemala 130,000 > Paraguay 170,000 > Uruguay 320,000 > U.S.A. 890,000 > > Guns per 31.4 inhabitants > Venezuela 3.5 > Guatemala 4.1 > Paraguay 5.3 > Uruguay 10 > U.S.A. 28 Well, it is kind of a stupid figure that you are using basically to cherry pick a big scary number (or what you obviously think is big and scary). The fact is, many gun owners own several guns (while many households in the US have zero)…often large numbers of them in collections…which means you are doing the equivalent of talking about US wealth per person. Roughly, that would be $200,000 dollars per person if we used a similar comparison (the US is worth roughly $100 trillion after all). Is that meaningful, and if so, what does it demonstrate exactly? A better metric would be what percentage of households in the US have a gun (maybe looked at over time)…then compare that to numbers of households in other countries that have guns. Kind of changes the answer and gives a more nuanced one at that. Since this was a response to me quibbling about the uniqueness or whatever of the US ‘gun culture’, I don’t think the number of firearms per capita really means anything. Certainly, there are more guns in the US, per capita than any other country…doesn’t make us unique, it makes us rich AND tolerant of private ownership. But there are other countries that are tolerant of private gun ownership that just aren’t as rich that are similar. As I said, I only semi-disagree with the whole gun culture being unique to the US meme…I think that it has some truth behind it, since guns are looked at differently in the US than just about every other nation. ---
**Author:** ![raventhief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/raventhief/32/4_2.png) [@raventhief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/raventhief)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2018, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/67 "2018-10-28T15:27:02Z")
I just saw a snippet of an interview with the guy whose father was told “whites don’t kill whites” and he said his father was kinda like ok and watched the shooter leave. I don’t know who did exchange gunfire with the shooter, but per this guy, it wasn’t his father. ---
**Author:** ![raventhief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/raventhief/32/4_2.png) [@raventhief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/raventhief)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2018, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/68 "2018-10-28T15:33:56Z")
> [@raventhief](#): > > I just saw a snippet of an interview with the guy whose father was told “whites don’t kill whites” and he said his father was kinda like ok and watched the shooter leave. I don’t know who did exchange gunfire with the shooter, but per this guy, it wasn’t his father. “If you don’t shoot, I won’t shoot,” and my dad just stood there and the guy took off." I guess it’s still ambiguous after all, as I have added nothing of value. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2018, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/69 "2018-10-28T16:48:33Z")
I haven’t read the thread, but… Every time I see the title I think ‘Ape has killed ape!’ ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2018, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/70 "2018-10-30T04:33:18Z")
> [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > Beliefs like this go hand in hand with white supremacy. Only those morally decrepit black people kill each other. And don’t forget that they also are out there killing up all the white folks, too. There is no need to concern ourselves with white-on-white crime with all these scary blacks running around. And raping the white women, don’t leave that out. Or is that only Hispanics? ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2018, 6:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/71 "2018-10-30T06:00:57Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > Sorry. Do you like one of these better? > Guns per million inhabitants > Venezuela 110,000 > Guatemala 130,000 > Paraguay 170,000 > Uruguay 320,000 > U.S.A. 890,000 > > Guns per 31.4 inhabitants > Venezuela 3.5 > Guatemala 4.1 > Paraguay 5.3 > Uruguay 10 > U.S.A. 28 No. Something more like “% of households that own a firearm” would be more informative and useful IMHO. Do you understand why that is? ETA: and upon reading a bit further, I see XT already explained it very well. ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2018, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/72 "2018-10-30T06:06:14Z")
> [@XT](#): > > Well, it is kind of a stupid figure that you are using basically to cherry pick a big scary number (or what you obviously think is big and scary). The fact is, many gun owners own several guns (while many households in the US have zero)…often large numbers of them in collections…which means you are doing the equivalent of talking about US wealth per person. Roughly, that would be $200,000 dollars per person if we used a similar comparison (the US is worth roughly $100 trillion after all). Is that meaningful, and if so, what does it demonstrate exactly? A better metric would be what percentage of households in the US have a gun (maybe looked at over time)…then compare that to numbers of households in other countries that have guns. Kind of changes the answer and gives a more nuanced one at that. > > Since this was a response to me quibbling about the uniqueness or whatever of the US ‘gun culture’, I don’t think the number of firearms per capita really means anything. Certainly, there are more guns in the US, per capita than any other country…doesn’t make us unique, it makes us rich AND tolerant of private ownership. But there are other countries that are tolerant of private gun ownership that just aren’t as rich that are similar. > > As I said, I only semi-disagree with the whole gun culture being unique to the US meme…I think that it has some truth behind it, since guns are looked at differently in the US than just about every other nation. Understand the psychology of a society that accepts individual gun ownership as a “right”. A firearm is an extension of the self. People who own firearms have, whether they realized it or not, accepted that they are embracing violence. I think that’s what Americans don’t understand about themselves. The decision to own a gun, to tolerate gun ownership, is a decision to accept gun violence. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2018, 6:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/73 "2018-10-30T06:11:43Z")
> [@asahi](#): > > Understand the psychology of a society that accepts individual gun ownership as a “right”. A firearm is an extension of the self. People who own firearms have, whether they realized it or not, accepted that they are embracing violence. > > I think that’s what Americans don’t understand about themselves. The decision to own a gun, to tolerate gun ownership, is a decision to accept gun violence. I think we understand ourselves just fine. Prohibition, the war on drugs, past gun bans (looking at DC & Chicago in particular): Americans aren’t all that good at following rules that ban things. I think we get that about ourselves, at least at some level. We realize that banning guns would not end gun violence any more than the war on drugs ended drug use or Prohibition ended the consumption of alcohol. ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2018, 6:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/74 "2018-10-30T06:31:43Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > I think we understand ourselves just fine. Prohibition, the war on drugs, past gun bans (looking at DC & Chicago in particular): Americans aren’t all that good at following rules that ban things. I think we get that about ourselves, at least at some level. We realize that banning guns would not end gun violence any more than the war on drugs ended drug use or Prohibition ended the consumption of alcohol. People have a much stronger desire to get high or drunk than they do to own a firearm. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2018, 6:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/75 "2018-10-30T06:36:44Z")
> [@asahi](#): > > People have a much stronger desire to get high or drunk than they do to own a firearm. That’s not true of everyone. ---
**Author:** ![kambuckta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/53a042/32.png) [@kambuckta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kambuckta)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2018, 6:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/76 "2018-10-30T06:52:10Z")
> [@asahi](#): > > People have a much stronger desire to get high or drunk than they do to own a firearm. > [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > That’s not true of everyone. So the desire to own a firearm is akin to an alcoholic hanging out for a drink or a stoner thinking about his next bong? Wow. That just brings the issue up to a whole n’other level HD. ---
**Author:** ![galen\_ubal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/galen_ubal/32/4440_2.png) [@galen\_ubal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/galen_ubal)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2018, 6:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/77 "2018-10-30T06:52:59Z")
**HurricaneDitka** , in 1996 Australia passed the National Firearms Agreement (NFA). This banned semi-automatic firearms, pump-action rifles and shotguns - some 650,000 were bought back by the Australian government. In the fourteen years following, as of the time of [this report (PDF)](https://cdn1.sph.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/1264/2012/10/bulletins_australia_spring_2011.pdf), there had been no mass shootings in Australia, as opposed to 13 in the 18 years prior to the NFA. I’ll just go ahead and quote a bit more here: > [@](#): > > The NFA also seems to have reduced firearm homicide outside of mass shootings, as well as firearm suicide. In the seven years before the NFA (1989-1995), the average annual firearm suicide death rate per 100,000 was 2.6 (with a yearly range of 2.2 to 2.9); in the seven years after the buyback was fully implemented (1998-2004), the average annual firearm suicide rate was 1.1 (yearly range 0.8 to 1.4). In the seven years before the NFA, the average annual firearm homicide rate per 100,000 was .43 (range .27 to .60) while for the seven years post NFA, the average annual firearm homicide rate was .25 (range .16 to .33). > Additional evidence strongly suggests that the buyback causally reduced firearm deaths. First, the drop in firearm deaths was largest among the type of firearms most affected by the buyback. Second, firearm deaths in states with higher buyback rates per capita fell proportionately more than in states with lower buyback rates. > > One evaluation of the law concluded that: The rates of total firearm deaths, firearm homicides and firearm suicides all at least doubled their existing rates of decline after the gun laws; there is no evidence of substitution for suicides or homicides.2 A more recent evaluation, which examined the differences across states, concluded that “the buyback led to a drop in the firearm suicide rates of almost 80 per cent, with no significant effect on non-firearm death rates. The effect on firearm homicides is of similar magnitude, but is less precise”. This incredible size of the effect (80% reduction) strains credulity {edited to remove citation numbers and a link} Now, a question - would you be willing to give up your semi-automatic weapons, and accept heavy restrictions on general gun licensing and storage, to reduce the firearm homicide death toll by some 40%? ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2018, 7:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/78 "2018-10-30T07:40:07Z")
> [@galen\_ubal](#): > > … would you be willing to give up your semi-automatic weapons, and accept heavy restrictions on general gun licensing and storage, to reduce the firearm homicide death toll by some 40%? It probably depends. What happens to the non-firearm homicide death toll? If giving up my RKBA saves ~4,000 lives I’d at least entertain the idea. If giving up my RKBA just ensures that 4,000 people are stabbed / beaten to death rather than shot, I wouldn’t be particularly interested. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2018, 7:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/79 "2018-10-30T07:45:43Z")
> [@kambuckta](#): > > So the desire to own a firearm is akin to an alcoholic hanging out for a drink or a stoner thinking about his next bong? … Those weren’t my words. “everyone” includes non-alcoholics and non-stoners. ---
**Author:** ![kambuckta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/53a042/32.png) [@kambuckta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kambuckta)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2018, 7:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496/80 "2018-10-30T07:55:17Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Those weren’t my words. “everyone” includes non-alcoholics and non-stoners. That’s even more worrisome. If you are suggesting that the _need_ to own a gun is stronger than the needs of non-alcoholics and non-stoners, do you not see a wee problem there? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whites-dont-kill-whites-shooting-at-kentucky-kroger-supermarket/823496.md?page=5)