School shootings

[Leisureguy]

I know you guys don't much trust Wikipedia, but I thought you (esp. Rob_TN) would find this article interesting, even if you don't consider it reliable.

On another aspect, I read something today that gave me pause: we are all, I think, shocked and dismayed by such a horrible incident, but someone pointed out that this sort of thing now happens EVERY DAY in Iraq. No wonder children there are showing stress illness. I now have a sense of what people there must feel, how they must live in fear.

No political comment, just the observation.

[fallingwickets]

Michael, I have to laugh. Laugh not in a funny hahaha way, but in a twisted ironic way. Nobody really knows these kids in VA. The country is stunned and people are walking around talking about it like the end of the world is near, yet 30 people die in a bomb blast in Iraq and these same people couldn't care less........."is American idol on tonight honey?" The story you refer to that ran this weekend in the Times about the kids in Iraq really brought the anguish closer to home.

No political comment, just an observation for me too.

[Rob]

I wasn't aware of the Appalachian School of Law shooting story. Thank you. I'm glad those students were able to subdue the murderer.

The VA Tech massacre is a horrible situation. The loss of life is devastating. I pray for the families of those lost and I also pray for the parents of the murderer.

[fallingwickets]

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Car bombs killed more than 170 people in Baghdad on Wednesday in the deadliest attacks in the city since U.S. and Iraqi forces launched a security crackdown aimed at halting the country's slide into civil war.

One car bomb alone in the mainly Shi'ite Sadriya neighborhood killed 122 people and wounded 155, police said.

Compared to this, VA is a drop in the bucket. What's all the disbelief about?

Clive
*feeling ultra cynical today*

[fallingwickets]

http://alternet.org/blogs/peek/50682/

[Sam]

Clive, the VT episode resonates with a lot of Americans, as did the Don Imus thing, as it hits closer to home. Just the same as 9/11 hit home, so does thinking that the shooting could have happened at any college and could have involved OUR kids. Iraq, people think that the ones that get killed are volunteers for war, and as such, knew a risk when they signed up. Yet college students do not assume such a big risk as random multiple killings. My daughter is in Knoxville and security has been ramped up this week. You are right, we should not look at the men and women in Iraq any differently, but the distance and the type of situation are distinguishable in the minds of many.

[fallingwickets]

Sam

Firstly, I hope your daughter stays safe.

Secondly, don't mind my cynical mood today. Tomorrow I'll be back to my old scoundrel, callous, cold-hearted, short-sighted and self-centred slubberdegullion ways.

Clive

[Sam]

Sam

Firstly, I hope your daughter stays safe.

Secondly, don't mind my cynical mood today. Tomorrow I'll be back to my old scoundrel, callous, cold-hearted, short-sighted and self-centred slubberdegullion ways.

Clive

1. Thank you. We feel secure. This tragedy could easily have happened anywhere, grade school or college.

2. Why send me to the dictionary? LOL. You are fine, and you were okay to make the observation. Food for thought.

[Zaniix]

I think the reason people are more worried about the VA Tech shooting is that I am not in danger in Iraq, I am not going to run into a car bomb in Iraq, but if a shooting could happen in a local college then everyone in the U.S. feels liek OMG that could happen to me.


The fact is these are always possabilities, but when reminded so closely to home it has a stronger effect.

I for one care just as much about the lives lost in Iraq as I do about the kids in VA Tech. Both would be examples of senseless violence, but at least the culrpit in the VA shooting has been stopped for good.

[rtaylor61]

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Car bombs killed more than 170 people in Baghdad on Wednesday in the deadliest attacks in the city since U.S. and Iraqi forces launched a security crackdown aimed at halting the country's slide into civil war.

One car bomb alone in the mainly Shi'ite Sadriya neighborhood killed 122 people and wounded 155, police said.

Compared to this, VA is a drop in the bucket. What's all the disbelief about?
Clive
*feeling ultra cynical today*

Maybe I missed it, but I don't recall the U.S. being a "declared war zone".

Randy

[notthesharpest]

Clive, the VT episode resonates with a lot of Americans, as did the Don Imus thing, as it hits closer to home. Just the same as 9/11 hit home, so does thinking that the shooting could have happened at any college and could have involved OUR kids. Iraq, people think that the ones that get killed are volunteers for war, and as such, knew a risk when they signed up. Yet college students do not assume such a big risk as random multiple killings. My daughter is in Knoxville and security has been ramped up this week. You are right, we should not look at the men and women in Iraq any differently, but the distance and the type of situation are distinguishable in the minds of many.

The "at-home" shootings do not actually touch the hearts of the American people any more than the deaths in Iraq do. It is merely the resulting media frenzy that makes it appear so. Stirring up false grief, over the death of someone the viewers have never heard of and were never interested in, is apparently an excellent source of media revenue. I wonder how the people who are truly grieving must feel about all this. It makes me want to puke.

[ScottS]

The VA governor said it nicely

Kaine cautioned against making snap judgments and said he had "nothing but loathing" for people who try to make the tragedy "their political hobbyhorse to ride."

[Leisureguy]

Sam, I think you misunderstand: the greatest number of people killed in the Iraq war are not US troops, but Iraqi citizens. Quite a few of those deaths have been noncombatant women and children. Those are the deaths that I think Clive was referring to as deaths that we simply ignore and have no feeling for. Just today, at least 171 people---humans, many of them women and children---were killed in bombings in Baghdad. (Photo of one scene at the link.) Many of those were undoubtedly just trying to go about their lives, as most people do. 171 is more than 5 times as many as were killed at Virginia Tech, though of course the impact and the horror are not simply a matter of numbers.

I was pointing out that it was hard to feel what it was like for the average Iraqi citizen, trying to work out a living, and having so much death, random death, happen daily. It's like having one or several Virginia Tech incidents every day. How awful it must be. And yet we don't feel it, until something like VT happens here.

Most of the Iraqi people don't want to be living in a declared war zone. The war came to them, they didn't go to the war. And now that the war's there, what are they to do? Just try to get by as best they can avoid militants of the Shiite or Sunni variety, try to stay out of the way---but then a bus is taken and all passengers having the name "Omar" are executed. A terrible situation.

[Pete_T]

Clive, the VT episode resonates with a lot of Americans, as did the Don Imus thing, as it hits closer to home. Just the same as 9/11 hit home, so does thinking that the shooting could have happened at any college and could have involved OUR kids. Iraq, people think that the ones that get killed are volunteers for war, and as such, knew a risk when they signed up. Yet college students do not assume such a big risk as random multiple killings. My daughter is in Knoxville and security has been ramped up this week. You are right, we should not look at the men and women in Iraq any differently, but the distance and the type of situation are distinguishable in the minds of many.

The "at-home" shootings do not actually touch the hearts of the American people any more than the deaths in Iraq do. It is merely the resulting media frenzy that makes it appear so. Stirring up false grief, over the death of someone the viewers have never heard of and were never interested in, is apparently an excellent source of media revenue. I wonder how the people who are truly grieving must feel about all this. It makes me want to puke.

Amen brother.

The media really pisses me off. They run around asking "How could this happen? Why would the shooters do this?" While they practically glorify and immortailze them. I dont know mr media, could it be a lonely little freak that nobody pays attention to, nor will ever want to pay attention to, sees an opportunity to have everyone talking about them non-stop for the next year? I swear some of these useless jerks can hardly contain their glee when this sort of thing happens.

Ive gotten to see at least two notable turds use this to promote thier agendas and themsleves. Jack Tomphson, and that complete waste of skin, "Dr Phil". These two Einsteins are trying to blame video games for it, without any evidence that the shooter every owned a game in his life. Id really love to get my hands on either one of them.

[Furrball2]

[quote="Leisureguy"]Iomeone pointed out that this sort of thing now happens EVERY DAY in Iraq. No wonder children there are showing stress illness. I now have a sense of what people there must feel, how they must live in fear.quote]

That someone was Keith Olberman.

Regarding the shootings, what is important to realize is how rare this event is. Thrity two people in a country of three hundred million, that is 0.0001 % of the population, or an incidence of 0.1 per 1000 people per year -- if you assume this happens annualy and it does not. Being struck by lightening is more statistically relevant(0.3-0.6 per 1000 people per year). Being killed in a car crash is more likely. 37,000 people a year seek emergency medical attention for NAIL gun injuries annually.

This is a tragedy but we would all be better off if we took control of the real hazards in our life and wash our hands, wear our seat belts, eat moderately, get a colonoscopy when you're 50, etc. Or you can buy into "if it bleeds it leads" mentality and spend your life afraid of the uncontrolable.

Just my 2 c, now I'm going to go to the dentist.

[Leisureguy]

Actually, the person who made me wake up was not Keith Olbermann. It was Juan Cole, a Mideast scholar. Here's the link. His exact words:

Remember that we’re all concerned, as we should be, about these events at Virginia Tech today. In Iraq this is a daily event. Imagine how horrible it would be if this kind of massacre were occurring every single day. And the people of Iraq feel that either the Americans are not stopping it or they’re actually causing it.

Also at that link (though not from Cole):

On Monday, the same day as the Virginia Tech mass shooting, two separate shooting incidents struck Mosul University, one killing Dr. Talal Younis al-Jelili, the dean of the college of Political Science as he walked through the university gate, and another killing Dr. Jaafar Hassan Sadeq, a professor from the Faculty of Arts at the school, who was targeted in front of his home in the al-Kifaat area, according to Aswat al-Iraq.

In January, Baghdad’s Mustansiriya University sufferred a double suicide bombing in January that killed at least 70 people, including students, faculty, and staff. A month later, another suicide bomber struck at Mustansiriya, killing 40.

Kidnappings of students and faculty are another all-too-common occurrence on Iraq’s campuses. Members of the univerisity community have been abducted and murdered for sectarian reasons, or simply held for ransom. […]

In January, students reported that violent events had threatened students that attendance rates at Baghdad University had dropped to six percent.

Earlier this month, the Dr. Qais Jawad al-Azzawi, head of the Geneva-based Committee International Committee of Solidarity with Iraqi Professors said that 232 university professors were killed and 56 were reported missing in Iraq, while more than 3,000 others had left the country after the 2003 invasion.

[tonyespo]

I was appalled to see Oprah even jumped on the get better ratings wagon today. She had a special on the VT shootings. The fact that they keep saying this was a national record could trigger some sick soul to try to break the record. He could be thinking if I just shoot 34 I could get my picture on Oprah.

Here in Charlotte we have 5 colleges and many campuses. There is no way to avoid something like this. If someone makes a plan to kill, they will find a way and no amount of security will stop them.

[fallingwickets]

Just throw Ms. Erika at them. That should stop them in their tracks

Clive

[Rob]

The "at-home" shootings do not actually touch the hearts of the American people any more than the deaths in Iraq do. It is merely the resulting media frenzy that makes it appear so. Stirring up false grief, over the death of someone the viewers have never heard of and were never interested in, is apparently an excellent source of media revenue. I wonder how the people who are truly grieving must feel about all this. It makes me want to puke.

Amen brother.

The media really pisses me off. They run around asking "How could this happen? Why would the shooters do this?" While they practically glorify and immortailze them. I dont know mr media, could it be a lonely little freak that nobody pays attention to, nor will ever want to pay attention to, sees an opportunity to have everyone talking about them non-stop for the next year? I swear some of these useless jerks can hardly contain their glee when this sort of thing happens.

Ive gotten to see at least two notable turds use this to promote thier agendas and themsleves. Jack Tomphson, and that complete waste of skin, "Dr Phil". These two Einsteins are trying to blame video games for it, without any evidence that the shooter every owned a game in his life. Id really love to get my hands on either one of them.

I truly loathe the media as well. They do immortalize mass murderers. Which is why we'll see this very situation again soon (in the next couple of months) at another school somewhere. They media hypes up a shooting, another murderer formulates his copycat plan, he executes his plan, and the media hypes up his evil deeds. He dies knowing that "everyone knows my name." He's famous. And isn't that what many people aspire to these days? To be famous? It's very disappointing.

I heard about that guy blaming video games, too. What a dolt. He's participating in the "shift the blame" game. Rather than just state the facts that the mass murderer is a mass murderer who was evil and wanted to murder. Instead, he'd rather attack a non-player in the massacre.

Did I mention I loathe the media? Barely 24 hours goes by before the media starts their political soapbox pertaining to the massacre. Sickening.

I certainly don't feel safe at my school. But that's not due to the VT massacre. I felt this way a long, long time ago.

[Lyrt]

For those interested, you can read two of Cho Seung-Hui's plays.