31 Dead In University Shootings

[Shapley]

how do you think the right to carry is a response to all the warning signs you said people didnt react to ?

Actually, I don't think you asked that specific question.

Anyhow, in answer to it, all I can offer is this: The only thing we can read from the 'warning signs' is that homicidal maniacs walk among us, day in and day out. We can't stop them without due cause, and they seem smart enough to not give us that. The killer may have sent 'signals', but they were not clear signs.

When we do see actual warning signs along the highway, we take appropriate action: We slow down for curves and trucks use low gear for steep grades, we look for flagmen when the signs say that they are present, we do not pass if the sign says 'do not pass'. We read and obey the signs, cognizant that failure to so puts us in peril.

If I read the message of the 'warning signs' the killer left us correctly, then the only appropriate actions I can see are either: a) isolate those who exhibit these symptoms with no regard for due process or individual rights, or b) arm ourselves against their possible future aggression. I vote for b), as I said in my earlier post.

I can't asnwer your question any better. If that is insufficient, so be it.

V/R
Shapley

[piqaboo]

[snickering] We could make fire-arm safety mandatory in schools. Classes would be taught at the kindergarten, 3rd, 6th, 8ths & 10th grade levels. Gotta get the gov't involved somehow or I cant get Shap fired up.[/snicker]

[Shapley]

Just like most peole don't advertise that they have a "gun infested home". Or maybe people do that?

some signs that are commonly available:

"Protected by Smith & Wesson"

"You Loot, I shoot"

"Is there life after death, trespass here and find out"

"To hell with the dog, beware of shotgun"

I've seen a few of these hanging on front doors.

[Selma in Sandy Eggo]

What is considered "behavior" that falls in the "sound the red alarm" category?

That would be when the weird kid who hardly ever talks actually pulls out a gun. That's the red alarm behavior.

When he fires the first shot, he promotes himself to the position of Target, and armed individuals in the area may properly return fire. If you're unarmed but close enough, consider throwing a couple of rocks, or books. If you're in a group, throw things and then mob him. Somebody might get shot, but probably not thirty-odd of you - and he'll be in a hurry and won't have time to aim.

Me, I'll be attempting to either trip, or whack, him with my cane.

[Shapley]

Oh, and I forgot my favourite:

"Trespassers will be shot. Survivors will be shot again."

[Haggis@wk]

My question remains unanswered, Shapley. how do you think the right to carry is a response to all the warning signs you said people didnt react to ? (You should go up and read my original post with the question, to ensure context). Am curious. Have worked with a few scary ones in the past. Went to school with one. At least 2 of them would not surprise me if they ended up in the news, due to dramatic suicide with or without involving others.

I thought I did earlier.

Evil is inevitable, unpredictable and so, unpreventable.

How much scarier could this kid have become? Students avoid being in class with him, teachers were afraid of him, he was a stalker and even his parents were afraid of and for him.

I said earlier that he could have told people he was going to kill 30 people next week, but without some corroboration nothing could have been done, nothing. Hell, I just found out Virginia has a law that make it unlawful to kick a suicidal person out of school (think they're going to rethink that one?? I'm not sure)

This word “civilization” has many people confused. Per capita, the same number of potentially evil people in the 10th, 11th and 14th Century exists in the 21st and because it’s “per capita” that means there just more of them.

Where are they? Everywhere is the best answer. Some become serial killers (the number of suspected but unknown serial killers in the U.S. by law enforcement would terrify you; one of the reason I pack) others lose their job and decide to go out in style by visiting the coworkers; some choose to blow up buildings and airplanes. And some just percolate under the radar.

And these folks have been around for a while. Think Columbine was the first school killing? Look up Andrew Kehoe he killed 45 kids. Bombs on planes are a ‘90s invention? Look up Jack Gilbert Graham. Think mass murder on school campuses is uniquely American? Look up Marc Lépine.

You might not be very religious but you don’t have to be to be convinced that evil people exist. I have looked into the eyes of arsonists, killers and Islam terrorists and I never saw anything that would resemble compassion. So, because we are civilized and can’t put them down we can lock the ones we catch away forever and be prepared to resist the ones we haven’t identified yet.

I am

[Haggis@wk]

[snickering] We could make fire-arm safety mandatory in schools. Classes would be taught at the kindergarten, 3rd, 6th, 8ths & 10th grade levels. Gotta get the gov't involved somehow or I cant get Shap fired up.[/snicker]

My father took me squirrel hunting when I was nine. I went to NRA firearms courses when I was in the seventh grade with .22 rifles and ammo provided by the U.S. Army. I could have participate in the fifth grade I think, but I was in Germany and didn't get back to U.S. based school until I was in the 7th grade.

I suspect that Shapley and Barfle have similar stories to tell

[Shapley]

Cat,

I had quite forgotten about Kimveer Gill, the shooter at Dawson College in Montreal. I only recalled the incident because his name came up in article on school shootings.

Canadian restrictions apparently weren't enough to prevent him from shooting up a school there. He killed himself, but only after being shot by a law enforcement officer. This happened last year. Marc Lepine, who
Haggis mentioned, commited a school shooting in the same city in 1989.

I'm not sure of all the reasons that schools are selected as targets. I suspect their vulnerablility is part of it. I also suspect that the terror aspect has a lot to do with it, as well. They have been targets for terrorists for decades.

V/R
Shapley

[Shapley]

Another school shooting, but this shooter only shot himself.

N.C. Teenager Kills Himself After Threatening Fellow High School Students at Gunpoint

[piqaboo]

how do you think the right to carry is a response to all the warning signs you said people didnt react to ?

Actually, I don't think you asked that specific question.

Yup, I did.

However, Shapley, your solution doesnt seem responsive to your noting of warning signs. Most of those shot dont seem to have been classmates, so how would they know to pack in class? I ask again, what reaction did you want to the warning behaviours of this person?

Meanwhile, it seems this attack was not total surprise to those who knew the killer. Of what use are all these warning signs to people who can't, or won't read them?

The same thing that was proposed a year ago - allow the people the arm themselves against the threat such people pose

.

I can't asnwer your question any better. If that is insufficient, so be it

The second answer tied the pieces together.
Your post about the warning signs had kindof a snarky "gee it was so OBvious, they shoulda just done ... " feel to it, but you've explained that since.

Haggis, I did merge you w Shap in one post, but in most, I think of you as independent individuals. If for no other reason than geography.

[piqaboo]

[snickering] We could make fire-arm safety mandatory in schools. Classes would be taught at the kindergarten, 3rd, 6th, 8ths & 10th grade levels. Gotta get the gov't involved somehow or I cant get Shap fired up.[/snicker]

My father took me squirrel hunting when I was nine. I went to NRA firearms courses when I was in the seventh grade with .22 rifles and ammo provided by the U.S. Army. I could have participate in the fifth grade I think, but I was in Germany and didn't get back to U.S. based school until I was in the 7th grade.

I suspect that Shapley and Barfle have similar stories to tell

These are good things. I honor and respect thy father. Wont happen for most kids. Besides, you took the gov't out of it, so it wont get Shap riled, and where's the fun in that?

[Shapley]

Besides, you took the gov't out of it, so it wont get Shap riled, and where's the fun in that?

My New Years Resolution this year was to not let myself get riled. So far I've done pretty good. I've gotten disgusted. I've felt defeated. But I haven't gotten riled.

I lost my father to cancer last November, and my younger brother to it last month. I've re-evaluated life and decided it's too short to let little things get me all riled up. In the long run, no matter what we do on this puny little planet, the Sun, the Moon, and the stars will go about their business with no notice. I am trying to take a lesson from them and do the same...

[Shapley]

I am trying to take a lesson from them and do the same...

Of course, when some nincompoop like this Cho guy kill 32 people out of sheer lunacy, it's difficult to not notice. I'm sure even the Moon shed a tear...

[jamiebk]

Every Boy Scout and YMCA camp that I went to growing up in PA had a rifle range with .22's. We all learned gun safety and marksmanship by at least age 10. No one got killed...no one went on an insane rampage...no one even disrespected the rules. Safety was #1 in the mind of the shooter and instructor.

When I moved to CA as an adult, before I could get a hunting license (though I had so in other states previously), I had to take a 3 week hunter safety course with a written test and field skills test at the end. I put my son Taylor through the same course. Today, we occassionally hunt together on our friend's ranch (deer, wild boar, and turkeys) and I feel 100% safe and comfortable doing so with him and our pals.

Yes, there are guns in my house and I am glad there are. They are locked and safe. I have never had an occassion to pull them out in response to a threat and I hope I never do. If that circumstance presents itself, I, at least, have the means to protect my family and myself.

[piqaboo]

I lost my father to cancer last November, and my younger brother to it last month.

I am very sorry.

[dai bread]

This is one of the occasions where I am bemused by American culture. A lot of you seem to feel that your fellow citizens are such a threat that you need to be armed against them.

I take comfort from reading that in fact, most Americans are unarmed.

[analog]

I lost my father to cancer last November, and my younger brother to it last month. I've re-evaluated life and decided it's too short to let little things get me all riled up. In the long run, no matter what we do on this puny little planet, the Sun, the Moon, and the stars will go about their business with no notice. I am trying to take a lesson from them and do the same...

I'm sorry Shap.

I guess it's natural to bury our parents. I am told it's a harder jolt to lose a sibling. The latter hasn't happened to me.

Your attitude is just right. Sometimes when I'm melancholy it's helpful to sit outdoors with my feet in moving water, it too goes on with business. The Ozark streams are just aboout warm enough now.

An easygoing person is probably more accessible to the realization of eternity--the endless flow of life and death--than one who takes his prospects and duties overseriously. It is the overserious who are truly frivolous. hoffer, of course

[jamiebk]

This is one of the occasions where I am bemused by American culture. A lot of you seem to feel that your fellow citizens are such a threat that you need to be armed against them.

I take comfort from reading that in fact, most Americans are unarmed.

I don't disagree....but it's the 1% of the armed maniacs that can get you. The "unarmed" Americans of whom you speak, pose no threat armed or not. They are good people. You simply can't control the criminals who will get the guns anyway. They are the ones I worry about

[Shapley]

Piq, and Analog,

Thanks.

Dai,

Re:

A lot of you seem to feel that your fellow citizens are such a threat that you need to be armed against them.

99 44/100% of my fellow citizens probably pose no threat to me, so I don't fear them. That remaining 56/100% are enough to worry about. It only takes one errant citizen to require me to need it.

Several years ago, near the town I used to live in, there was a double murder. It would have been a triple murder, but God intervened. My neighbor, a patron at the store at which the murder took place, was kidnapped and thrown in the trunk of the car. The killers left the scene and drove through town, where the car mysteriously overturned and landed in a ditch. The killers attempted to 'finish off' the woman, but either had no bullets or the gun misfired, I do not recall which. The killers fled through town on foot.

The town had one police officer, on hearing of the crime he drove the mayor out of town to the crime scene, abandoning his post, IMHO. He spent the next few hours not patrolling the streets. The killers whereabouts were unknown. I loaded my semi-automatic rifle and kept it by my side the rest of the evening. The killers were not caught until the following day, in a neighboring town. It is incidents such as this that, while very rare, necessitate the arming of the citizenry.

As a husband, a father, and a citizen, it is my duty to ensure the safety of those I am entrusted to love, honour, and protect. I would think myself less of a man if I failed to my best to do so.

V/R
Shapley

[barfle]

I'm not for everyone and their mother owning a gun.

Neither am I. I believe the standard for firearm ownership should be higher than for motor vehicle ownership, although I would be willing to bet more people died from motor vehicle incidents on Monday than died of firearm incidents (maybe leaving Iraq out of the equation).

I don't own a gun myself, although I have in the past. It cost too much for ammunition, and I let it deteriorate to the point that I felt it would be better utilized by someone else.

But outlawing guns doesn't work, at least often enough.