Shooting on Virginia Tech campus

[Spitfire]

So sad.
What a waste of life, future everything.
Just because some people obviously believes, the only way out of any problem - real or unreal - is with a weapon in hand.

 

[Fletch]

This country has a real existential dilemma surrounding guns. We were created by revolution and by war, and our continent opened up mostly by people who really needed the option of deadly force.

But it's gone too far. Like the information age desk jockey who can't stop eating huge farmhand meals, too many of us are obsessed with the idea of guns as something essential to our safety or manhood or nationhood. They're deep in our pop culture and our laws (or lack of them, in states like Virginia).

We probably didn't make this kid crazy, but we sure didn't do much to stand in his way.

We also can't really face up to the cost of our gun beliefs. A fear-mongering gun industry has a lot of political and media power and has a lot of people convinced that it's their patriotic duty to support that industry. Any time a mass shooting happens, everybody has to focus on the shooter and not draw any parallels to other, similar shootings. If you mouth off about gun laws or gun culture, you get a $%##storm of invective shot at you by professional spindoctors, along with a lot of well-meaning but misguided comments by civilians.

 

[June]

Growing up in VA, I had several friends who graduated from Tech. Two others currently have nieces and nephews attending (all are safe). I had the opportunity to visit the campus a couple of times during college. It's a beautiful place. It's hard to know what to think or say at a time like this.

 

[Vladimir Berkov]

This country has a real existential dilemma surrounding guns. We were created by revolution and by war, and our continent opened up mostly by people who really needed the option of deadly force.

But it's gone too far. Like the information age desk jockey who can't stop eating huge farmhand meals, too many of us are obsessed with the idea of guns as something essential to our safety or manhood or nationhood. They're deep in our pop culture and our laws (or lack of them, in states like Virginia).

We probably didn't make this kid crazy, but we sure didn't do much to stand in his way.

We also can't really face up to the cost of our gun beliefs. A fear-mongering gun industry has a lot of political and media power and has a lot of people convinced that it's their patriotic duty to support that industry. Any time a mass shooting happens, everybody has to focus on the shooter and not draw any parallels to other, similar shootings. If you mouth off about gun laws or gun culture, you get a $%##storm of invective shot at you by professional spindoctors, along with a lot of well-meaning but misguided comments by civilians.

I don't want to start a political thing, but this is just too wrong. The "gun culture" didn't cause this guy to go crazy and murder 33 people. If you want to argue that gun laws would have prevented this, then you have to explain why it happened at all in a place where possession of a handgun is illegal.

 

[Feraud]

So sad.
What a waste of life, future everything.
Just because some people obviously believes, the only way out of any problem - real or unreal - is with a weapon in hand.

Precisely. Lack of options and alternatives is a culprit here.

 

[The Wingnut]

We also can't really face up to the cost of our gun beliefs. A fear-mongering gun industry has a lot of political and media power and has a lot of people convinced that it's their patriotic duty to support that industry. Any time a mass shooting happens, everybody has to focus on the shooter and not draw any parallels to other, similar shootings. If you mouth off about gun laws or gun culture, you get a $%##storm of invective shot at you by professional spindoctors, along with a lot of well-meaning but misguided comments by civilians.

That's it, I'm coming out of hiatus.

GARBAGE. Unmitigated crap. A gun ban would have done nothing to stop this person from doing what they did. Lacking a firearm, they would still have found a weapon and commited violent acts...the lack of a firearm would simply have slowed them down.

We live in a culture that is quick to point its finger at an inanimate object and scream 'EVIL!' while the person that would pick it up and use it on someone else will be exonerated as simply a victim of their surroundings and culture. The problem is not firearms, it is the prevailing sheeplike mentality of the general public that prevented someone from throwing a chair at the gunman's head or tackling him and beating the daylights out of him as he rampaged through classrooms, executing innocent people. Instead of mobbing the gunman and taking him down, people jumped from windows and injured themselves to get away. Absurd.

Fear mongering? Oh, yes. That's all you'll ever see in news media. We have everything to fear, and if you don't cower in fear, you're not paying attention.

Absurd. This entire incident is a travesty, but the public reaction is almost worse.

I'm outta here.

 

[Rooster]

This country has a real existential dilemma surrounding guns. We were created by revolution and by war, and our continent opened up mostly by people who really needed the option of deadly force.

But it's gone too far. Like the information age desk jockey who can't stop eating huge farmhand meals, too many of us are obsessed with the idea of guns as something essential to our safety or manhood or nationhood. They're deep in our pop culture and our laws (or lack of them, in states like Virginia).

We probably didn't make this kid crazy, but we sure didn't do much to stand in his way.

We also can't really face up to the cost of our gun beliefs. A fear-mongering gun industry has a lot of political and media power and has a lot of people convinced that it's their patriotic duty to support that industry. Any time a mass shooting happens, everybody has to focus on the shooter and not draw any parallels to other, similar shootings. If you mouth off about gun laws or gun culture, you get a $%##storm of invective shot at you by professional spindoctors, along with a lot of well-meaning but misguided comments by civilians.

I own several hundred guns. I havn't as yet killed or harmed anyone. It's most unlikely I ever will. GUNS don't kill people, PEOPLE kill people. There are more deaths by autos every year than there are by guns.

 

[Fletch]

I don't want to speak to that - in part because it'll get the thread locked, but in part because you aren't the problem, so why feel threatened?

PS, I'm from Iowa myself. In fact I'm there right now.

 

[Paisley]

"A Real Gentleman"

A Romanian news source reports that a Holocost survivor, Professor Liviu Librescu, used his body to block the door to his classroom, thus saving his students. Prof. Librescu was killed.

 

[Marc Chevalier]

Fear mongering? Oh, yes. That's all you'll ever see in news media. We have everything to fear, and if you don't cower in fear, you're not paying attention.

It goes both ways, Wingnut. It's not just the media that stoops to fear mongering. There's another group in power that has done the same thing consistently for the past 5 1/2 years. I'll say no more than that.

.

 

[Marc Chevalier]

A Romanian news source reports that a Holocost survivor, Professor Liviu Librescu, used his body to block the door to his classroom, thus saving his students. Prof. Librescu was killed.

I mourn this man with all my heart. As a fellow teacher, I lit a candle for him this morning.

.

 

[Miss Neecerie]

As the Original Poster...

How about we keep this thread off 'policy' and so forth...and on either things like Paisley posted, or just the sadness and tragedy.

I had no desire to see this turn into gun policy, etc...and I will just remove my whole post or request it all be removed if thats what this thread stays on.

 

[Fletch]

My apologies Neece. I for one won't pursue the digression further.

 

[plain old dave]

The saddest thing of all with the whole VA deal is that it could have been EASILY prevented with one modification of VA law and VT policy to allow possession of a given item on campus. I will say no more.

 

[Marc Chevalier]

My apologies Neece. I for one won't pursue the digression further.

Ditto. My apologies.

.

 

[Marc Chevalier]

I'm not speaking solely to the incident of school shootings or the like, I'm speaking in a more general sense of kids/young people being able to bring questionable objects into a school building in the first place.

The saddest thing of all with the whole VA deal is that it could have been EASILY prevented with one modification of VA law and VT policy to allow possession of a given item on campus.

These two opinions are mutually exclusive. So ... which is it gonna be?

.

 

[Miss Neecerie]

These two are mutually exclusive. So ... which is it gonna be?

.

Sir....

 

[LadyStardust]

A Romanian news source reports that a Holocost survivor, Professor Liviu Librescu, used his body to block the door to his classroom, thus saving his students. Prof. Librescu was killed.

I found this especially tragic. What a brave, selfless man.

 

[Marc Chevalier]

Sir....

You're right. I'll be quiet.

.

 

[Miss Neecerie]

You're right. I'll be quiet.

.

Start your own thread...see how long it lasts....but leave this one for a non-policy discussion of things...