Mass Shootings

[JBJ 3648]

Mentioning reverse-causation is not the same as accounting for it.  It should be a quantifiable variable contributing to the conclusion.  Instead, it is specifically mentioned as an important limitation of the study.   One that is shown in other studies to completely change conclusions. 

Along with the general affect that more violent neighborhoods will have more guns, it really affects their results in these manners:

(1) they didn't account for homicides where the homeowner killed an assailant (which is crucial to a study of whether guns make you safer or not).  Although they do mention that in only 5% of unsuccessful self-defense attempts the victim had a gun.  You need to know the successful attempts to make any determination.  This is enough to dismiss the paper entirely.

(2) They didn't account for justifiable homicides between residents even though it was a variable in their study.  They didn't dismiss it either, they just chose to focus on homicides instead of criminal homicides.  What is safer for a victim of a crime is not safer for the perpetruator.  It's an important distinction.  It doesn't dismiss the results, but it skews it.  Of course you are not safer if you are attacking your roommate and he has a gun.  Your roommate certainly is though.  The paper is forced to conclude that you both aren't because they didn't bother to make the distinction.

Edited May 30, 2018 by JBJ

[atomheartbevo 89390]

4 hours ago, jimmyjazz said:

This is a silly argument.  We already have restrictions on gun ownership.  The debate is about where to draw the line.

We already restrict felons from owning firearms, and by proxy, we restrict those in their household from owning, since roommates/family members can find themselves in deep shit if they have firearms in the house with a felon and can't prove they had those firearms completely secured from said felon.

States are starting to flag potential problems a lot more - folks who do shit that doesn't rise to a felony (yet), but that are clearly on that path.  Some mental health issues get flagged.

We should be able to take it a step further - way too many of these shooters had already been in contact with some form of mental healthcare, way too many had access to firearms from family members.  It should not be that hard to restrict those people from having access to firearms in the home through an improved background check that would flag households of those who have mental health issues.  

I know, the NRA fans will lose their shit and say we are penalizing family members who don't have issues, but the NRA is not about trying to fix the problem, they are in fact profiting off of it.  And I know plenty of people will probably refuse to get their kids treated so that they can keep their guns, but it's a discussion that needs to be had.

[Brisketexan 104532]

3 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

We already restrict felons from owning firearms, and by proxy, we restrict those in their household from owning, since roommates/family members can find themselves in deep shit if they have firearms in the house with a felon and can't prove they had those firearms completely secured from said felon.

States are starting to flag potential problems a lot more - folks who do shit that doesn't rise to a felony (yet), but that are clearly on that path.  Some mental health issues get flagged.

We should be able to take it a step further - way too many of these shooters had already been in contact with some form of mental healthcare, way too many had access to firearms from family members.  It should not be that hard to restrict those people from having access to firearms in the home through an improved background check that would flag households of those who have mental health issues.  

I know, the NRA fans will lose their shit and say we are penalizing family members who don't have issues, but the NRA is not about trying to fix the problem, they are in fact profiting off of it.  And I know plenty of people will probably refuse to get their kids treated so that they can keep their guns, but it's a discussion that needs to be had.

The bolded part is true...and it baffles me.  If one of my kids had real issues that put them at risk of self harm or harm to others....my guns would migrate to a friend or family member's house posthaste.

[BabaYaga 15205]

18 minutes ago, GW Hayduke said:

"We observed a robust correlation between higher levels of gun ownership and higher firearm homicide rates. Although we could not determine causation,

Were they also able to observe a robust correlation between car ownership levels and higher levels of automobile crashes between those that didn't....

[atomheartbevo 89390]

3 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

The bolded part is true...and it baffles me.  If one of my kids had real issues that put them at risk of self harm or harm to others....my guns would migrate to a friend or family member's house posthaste.

Way too many of these parents pull the "I can't believe he would do that, that's not who he was" and then you dig deeper and find out that was exactly who he was, completely with wearing a "Born to Kill" t-shirt.

Earlier in the thread, I was pushing that we should hold parents/family members criminally responsible for kids doing stupid shit with guns.  They usually already get plenty of civil lawsuits filed and to me, it's not that far of a step from the many states that see people prosecuted for having dangerous dogs that get lose and wreak havoc.

But I guarantee the NRA and GOP would fight it tooth-and-nail.  

So it goes right back to preventing access in the first place.

[BabaYaga 15205]

7 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

Way too many of these parents pull the "I can't believe he would do that, that's not who he was" and then you dig deeper and find out that was exactly who he was, completely with wearing a "Born to Kill" t-shirt.

Earlier in the thread, I was pushing that we should hold parents/family members criminally responsible for kids doing stupid shit with guns.  They usually already get plenty of civil lawsuits filed and to me, it's not that far of a step from the many states that see people prosecuted for having dangerous dogs that get lose and wreak havoc.

But I guarantee the NRA and GOP would fight it tooth-and-nail.  

So it goes right back to preventing access in the first place.

This is punitive.  Not prohibitive.  It "might" help.  It might not.  I would say it "probably" would help, but to what extent?  And what are the criteria?  Wearing an offensive T-shirt?  Porn?  Sadistic movies/games?  A diagnosis?  Of what?  Are we profiling now?  Denying rights without due process?  Fine, but for how long?  Much like the opaque no-fly list:  how did I get on it, do I know I'm on it, and how do I get off?  And if the state lays out a clear and comprehensive list of steps needing to be taken to secure firearms.  And I follow these steps.  And a weapon is still stolen.  Then what?  Punishment anyways?

As already posted, many of these shootings were facilitated via failures of the FBI and local LE.  These monsters were reported multiple times and nothing was done.  After securing the schools, how are we not starting here?  

Edited May 30, 2018 by BabaYaga

[HoustonHorn 1059]

I think we've about solved it guys. Good work. Good Talk.

[BabaYaga 15205]

Gov. Abbott taking steps:  good for him

http://www.kbtx.com/content/news/Gov-Abbott-unveils-plan-to-increase-school-safety-484070941.html

https://www.kagstv.com/article/news/local/gov-greg-abbott-announces-school-safety-plan-and-proposed-changes-to-gun-laws/499-559906254

 

Summary:

• Expansion of "school marshal" program -- arm teachers & school staff (with State funding)
• Active shooter alarms (separate from fire alarms) in schools
• Tightening State penalties around inappropriate storage/access to firearms in homes
• Proposed the expansion of the mental health screening program started at Texas Tech to make it more widely available
• Suggested creation of a grant program to fund more collaborative agreements btw. school districts and local law enforcement

[GW Hayduke 1951]

12 minutes ago, JBJ said:

Mentioning reverse-causation is not the same as accounting for it.  It should be a quantifiable variable contributing to the conclusion.  Instead, it is specifically mentioned as an important limitation of the study.   One that is shown in other studies to completely change conclusions. 

Along with the general affect that more violent neighborhoods will have more guns, it really affects their results in these manners:

(1) they didn't account for homicides where the homeowner killed an assailant (which is crucial to a study of whether guns make you safer or not).  Although they do mention that in only 5% of unsuccessful self-defense attempts the victim had a gun.  You need to know the successful attempts to make any determination.  This is enough to dismiss the paper entirely.

(2) They didn't account for justifiable homicides between residents even though it was a variable in their study.  They didn't dismiss it either, they just chose to focus on homicides instead of criminal homicides.  What is safer for a victim of a crime is not safer for the perpetrator.  It's an important distinction.  It doesn't dismiss the results, but it skews it.  Of course you are not safer if you are attacking your roommate and he has a gun.  Your roommate certainly is though.  The paper is forced to conclude that you both aren't because they didn't bother to make the distinction.

"The general affect that more violent neighborhoods will have more guns." Neighborhoods were controlled in the study. 

1) "They didn't account for homicides where the homeowner killed an assailant."  They didn't count the killed assailant as a homicide - since they were focused on risks/protective affects of the victim/homeowner. Why count the assailant as a homicide when you are measuring effects to the homeowner?   "This is enough to dismiss the paper entirely." whoa hold up your horses!  Don't take offense to this, but the study is rather important and this was one of the main reasons that CDC funding for work like this was attacked and shut down.

2) There weren't differentiating "justifiable" homicides. How is that important when understanding the risk/protection effects to victims? Help me understand.

[jimmyjazz 45537]

30 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

The bolded part is true...and it baffles me.  If one of my kids had real issues that put them at risk of self harm or harm to others....my guns would migrate to a friend or family member's house posthaste.

Yes, but with a caveat:  we really need to authorize sound, objective science-based research into the correlations (if any) between mental health and homicide, including mass shootings.  From what I can tell, there is at best a murky read on the issue.  Basing policy on something that "feels" right can be fraught with error.

[jimmyjazz 45537]

12 minutes ago, BabaYaga said:

Gov. Abbott taking steps: 

Not really possible.

[atomheartbevo 89390]

15 minutes ago, BabaYaga said:

This is punitive.  Not prohibitive.  It "might" help.  It might not.  I would say it "probably" would help, but to what extent?  And what are the criteria?  Wearing an offensive T-shirt?  Porn?  Sadistic movies/games?  A diagnosis?  Of what?  Are we profiling now?  Denying rights without due process?  Fine, but for how long?  Much like the opaque no-fly list:  how did I get on it, do I know I'm on it, and how do I get off?  And if the state lays out a clear and comprehensive list of steps needing to be taken to secure firearms.  And I follow these steps.  And a weapon is still stolen.  Then what?  Punishment anyways?

As already posted, many of these shootings were facilitated via failures of the FBI and local LE.  These monsters were reported multiple times and nothing was done.  After securing the schools, how are we not starting here?  

We don't have a problem keeping firearms away from felons, I don't see why we should have a problem keeping them away from people who have mental health issues.  Far too many of these shooters were known to the mental health system in some capacity, and more than a few required psychotropic medication.  

I know it's fun to blame the FBI and local LEOs, and they certainly have their share of fuckups, but we've also heard far too many times that the kid was giving off warning signs and the family was choosing to ignore them.  I know that many parents simply don't want to deal with that shit or want to live in denial, but they bear a lot of the responsibility.  

[atomheartbevo 89390]

10 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

Yes, but with a caveat:  we really need to authorize sound, objective science-based research into the correlations (if any) between mental health and homicide, including mass shootings.  From what I can tell, there is at best a murky read on the issue.  Basing policy on something that "feels" right can be fraught with error.

If you shoot up a school full of your classmates, you have some serious mental health issues.  

That doesn't mean that every bipolar kid is a few days or weeks of missed medication away from shooting up his school, but we can start trying out rational policies based on what we've already seen with a lot of these kids having mental issues (and that carries up into the older shooters like Aurora and VT).  

The alternative is that we will see policies based a mass shooting that we can't even comprehend (the live-streamed mass shooting that we all know is coming, whether it's a year, 5 years, or 10 years from now) and those policies will be drawn up by people who already hate guns to begin with.

[wildcat09 29212]

32 minutes ago, BabaYaga said:

Gov. Abbott taking steps:  good for him

http://www.kbtx.com/content/news/Gov-Abbott-unveils-plan-to-increase-school-safety-484070941.html

https://www.kagstv.com/article/news/local/gov-greg-abbott-announces-school-safety-plan-and-proposed-changes-to-gun-laws/499-559906254

 

Summary:

• Expansion of "school marshal" program -- arm teachers & school staff (with State funding)
• Active shooter alarms (separate from fire alarms) in schools
• Tightening State penalties around inappropriate storage/access to firearms in homes
• Proposed the expansion of the mental health screening program started at Texas Tech to make it more widely available
• Suggested creation of a grant program to fund more collaborative agreements btw. school districts and local law enforcement

Ah yes, arming teachers. That'll help.

Narrator in five years: it didn't.

[BabaYaga 15205]

12 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

We don't have a problem keeping firearms away from felons, I don't see why we should have a problem keeping them away from people who have mental health issues

It's VASTLY more difficult to define and diagnose what mental health issues we are going to justify banning constitutional right over than those that commit felonies.  Define "mental health issues" to begin with?  ADHD?  Bipolar disorder?  Depression?  Now correlate how this makes you a threat to others to the extent that their rights are taken away?  Surely you see where this could lead.

[JBJ 3648]

1 hour ago, GW Hayduke said:

"The general affect that more violent neighborhoods will have more guns." Neighborhoods were controlled in the study. 

1) "They didn't account for homicides where the homeowner killed an assailant."  They didn't count the killed assailant as a homicide - since they were focused on risks/protective affects of the victim/homeowner. Why count the assailant as a homicide when you are measuring effects to the homeowner?   "This is enough to dismiss the paper entirely." whoa hold up your horses!  Don't take offense to this, but the study is rather important and this was one of the main reasons that CDC funding for work like this was attacked and shut down.

2) There weren't differentiating "justifiable" homicides. How is that important when understanding the risk/protection effects to victims? Help me understand.

They controlled many things on a neighborhood-level (income, race, age), not crime rate.

1) Knowing whether gun-owners were more likely to defend themselves from an assailant would have side-stepped the correlation/causation problem. Starting from a premise that existing life-risks don't affect gun ownership is faulty.

2) This is basically the same as above, but for something they actually collected and chose not to use (justified homicides within temhe home).  I already explained.  They treated the victim of domestic violence the same as the perpetrator - and the same as a random murder.  There is an important distinction to be made here.  Defending yourself from domestic violence is a reward of gun-ownership, the study treats it as a risk.

Edited May 30, 2018 by JBJ

[hayden_horn 11360]

11 minutes ago, wildcat09 said:

Ah yes, arming teachers. That'll help.

Narrator in five years: it didn't.

i don't think i would want my kids teacher strapped in school. these people are already criminally underpaid, now we want to arm them in the classroom and charge them with the responsibility of fighting back against a school shooter? can you imagine the potential for utter chaos in this situation? jesus, in the pantheon of bad ideas...we already expect teachers to do everything for basically a song. and now this.

[BabaYaga 15205]

2 minutes ago, hayden_horn said:

i don't think i would want my kids teacher strapped in school. these people are already criminally underpaid, now we want to arm them in the classroom and charge them with the responsibility of fighting back against a school shooter? can you imagine the potential for utter chaos in this situation? jesus, in the pantheon of bad ideas...we already expect teachers to do everything for basically a song. and now this.

"Strapped in school" - no. 

A gun under lock and key in the classroom, provided only to teachers that voluntarily undertook CCW  and firearm training for the strict purposes of barricading themselves and their students in the classroom as a last ditch effort to protect the class after the door has been barricaded and alarm sounded - yes

 

[wildcat09 29212]

3 minutes ago, hayden_horn said:

i don't think i would want my kids teacher strapped in school. these people are already criminally underpaid, now we want to arm them in the classroom and charge them with the responsibility of fighting back against a school shooter? can you imagine the potential for utter chaos in this situation? jesus, in the pantheon of bad ideas...we already expect teachers to do everything for basically a song. and now this.

I'm friends with a few high school teachers and through them know many of their friends that they teach with. There isn't a single one of them that thinks arming teachers is anything but a horrible idea. 

[Bert Orange 1115]

I don’t see how arming teachers will have much of any impact. Most of these nuts went in expecting to die, by cop, guard or self inflicted means. I would think this might actually provide a challenge and, in a way, egg crazies on. 

[jimmyjazz 45537]

25 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

If you shoot up a school full of your classmates, you have some serious mental health issues.  

This is part of the problem.  You are pre-supposing the cause.  I'm not necessarily against efforts to identify potential problems a priori, but we have to be careful.  

It's entirely possible that a kid who would not be diagnosed as "mentally ill" will still go on one of these rampages.  The current thinking indicates this is mostly true.  "Mental illness" is a convenient buzzword to fall back on, but it's important to determine if what you say is ACTUALLY true.

[BabaYaga 15205]

Just now, Bert Orange said:

I don’t see how arming teachers will have much of any impact. Most of these nuts went in expecting to die, by cop, guard or self inflicted means. I would think this might actually provide a challenge and, in a way, egg crazies on. 

The Parkland shooter was found trying to escape with the ensuing chaos after he ditched the outfit he wore while shooting.  He wore a gas mask to try and hide his identity and shoot/move/reload among the poor visibility created by smoke grenades he used.  He was only outed by students who knew him (and probably were involved in the dozens of reports to local LE and the FBI that he was a psycho).  

[Bert Orange 1115]

1 minute ago, BabaYaga said:

The Parkland shooter was found trying to escape with the ensuing chaos after he ditched the outfit he wore while shooting.  He wore a gas mask to try and hide his identity and shoot/move/reload among the poor visibility created by smoke grenades he used.  He was only outed by students who knew him (and probably were involved in the dozens of reports to local LE and the FBI that he was a psycho).  

I said most

[Brisketexan 104532]

I’d opt out of arming teachers, and work towards hardening classroom doors. If you have an armed officer on campus, he should be able to get to the location before the door fails.

[R2D2 91]

So - MORE GUNS. that's always the solution isn't it 

Dumb fuckin country!

[atomheartbevo 89390]

13 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

This is part of the problem.  You are pre-supposing the cause.  I'm not necessarily against efforts to identify potential problems a priori, but we have to be careful.  

It's entirely possible that a kid who would not be diagnosed as "mentally ill" will still go on one of these rampages.  The current thinking indicates this is mostly true.  "Mental illness" is a convenient buzzword to fall back on, but it's important to determine if what you say is ACTUALLY true.

Sane people do not shoot up schools, and too many of these shooters were known to the system already, or were giving off signs that they should have been checked out.  At the very least, there was enough there that the families should have done a little more to secure their firearms.

 

[jimmyjazz 45537]

4 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

Sane people do not shoot up schools,

I'm gonna say this one more time for now, because you seem unwilling to go do your homework:  "sane people do not shoot up schools" is a complete red herring.  "Insane" means something.  Stop with the convenient broad brush.

[atomheartbevo 89390]

38 minutes ago, BabaYaga said:

It's VASTLY more difficult to define and diagnose what mental health issues we are going to justify banning constitutional right over than those that commit felonies.  Define "mental health issues" to begin with?  ADHD?  Bipolar disorder?  Depression?  Now correlate how this makes you a threat to others to the extent that their rights are taken away?  Surely you see where this could lead.

The alternative is we do what the GOP is currently doing - jack shit, or we turn our schools into prisons or we do stupid shit like introduce more guns into schools (surely they will never be accidentally left somewhere or a student wouldn't try and take it) or we pile up the kids at checkpoints, making for tempting targets.

When we get a live-streamed shooting and millions of people watch kids die in real-time, whether it's a year, 5 years , or 10 years from now, we will see gun control that affects everybody, not just those with mental health issues.   And if you think it won't stand up to judicial scrutiny, the AWB would like to have a word with you.  

[Bert Orange 1115]

20 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

I’d opt out of arming teachers, and work towards hardening classroom doors. If you have an armed officer on campus, he should be able to get to the location before the door fails.

Can’t the shooter just wait until a class change?  Or lunch?

[HoustonHorn 1059]

8 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

This is part of the problem.  You are pre-supposing the cause.  I'm not necessarily against efforts to identify potential problems a priori, but we have to be careful.  

It's entirely possible that a kid who would not be diagnosed as "mentally ill" will still go on one of these rampages.  The current thinking indicates this is mostly true.  "Mental illness" is a convenient buzzword to fall back on, but it's important to determine if what you say is ACTUALLY true. 

Again, without going into definitions, I think everyone can agree that something is wrong with people who decide the best way to handle whatever issues they are facing is to kill classmates. Call it whatever you want but it is not a normal reaction based on the fact that millions and millions of kids don't do it. I am not actually proposing any sort of mental health means test for having access to weapons - I think that's something that requires much more research. But what can we do to address the issues which may lead certain individuals to this sort of flawed decision-making. What is the underlying root cause of white male kids feeling this is the best approach. This isn't an easy questions and I think its multi-faceted. Unfortunately a lot of the kids who do this end up dying/committing suicide in the process which makes research more difficult.

Its easy to point at guns and say we need to figure out some reasonable measures to restrict access. That's been discussed ad nauseum here after every single event and I think most reasonable people on both sides agree some measures might be acceptable and would help to some degree. But millions of kids have some sort of access to guns and nearly all of them never consider the possibility of using them for mass murder. I'm not sure that access has materially changed over the last 30 years, although I'm sure someone will point out some statistic to say otherwise. As I said, reasonable measures should be taken, but that's a long-term solution and hopefully something that begins in earnest soon.

But beyond guns/gun access, something is making mass shootings more prevalent. I think its worth exploring those potential factors that make mass murder a viable option for an increasing number of kids.

[jimmyjazz 45537]

1 minute ago, HoustonHorn said:

Again, without going into definitions, I think everyone can agree that something is wrong with people who decide the best way to handle whatever issues they are facing is to kill classmates.

I completely agree.  It's not "normal".  It just doesn't mean that such a person would likely be diagnosed as psychotic, schizophrenic, or even depressed or bipolar.  White, male, and angry seem to be the most common characteristics, and until we lump "angry" in with "mental illness" we should be careful with language and policy.

[Brisketexan 104532]

5 minutes ago, Bert Orange said:

Can’t the shooter just wait until a class change?  Or lunch?

Yes, of course.  But kids can retreat into classrooms and barricade themselves in.

There's no perfect solution.  After all, if the "arm teachers" plan has the gun in a lockbox in the classroom, we face the same problem -- the means of protection is not adjacent to the threat.

Nothing's perfect.  We can't design a car (that anyone can afford) that can survive a head-on collision with a truck going 90 mph.  But we can design for 60 mph, and install highway barriers, etc.

I can find a hole in every single measure anyone has proposed.  There is ALWAYS a vulnerability.  The question is whether that vulnerability is so large that it renders to measure generally ineffective.  In the case of hardening classrooms, I think that the hole is not so big as to render the solution a bad idea.

[HoustonHorn 1059]

4 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

I completely agree.  It's not "normal".  It just doesn't mean that such a person would likely be diagnosed as psychotic, schizophrenic, or even depressed or bipolar.  White, male, and angry seem to be the most common characteristics, and until we lump "angry" in with "mental illness" we should be careful with language and policy.

Agreed, so what is the source of anger.

And not looking for policy changes necessarily, but possibly common sense approach to the issues which are leading to this anger.

Edited May 30, 2018 by HoustonHorn

[jimmyjazz 45537]

1 minute ago, HoustonHorn said:

Agreed, so what is the source of anger.

That would make for a great peer-reviewed scientific study.

[wildcat09 29212]

22 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

Sane people do not shoot up schools, and too many of these shooters were known to the system already, or were giving off signs that they should have been checked out.  At the very least, there was enough there that the families should have done a little more to secure their firearms.

 

Entitlement-fueled anger isn't a mental illness.

[atomheartbevo 89390]

3 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

I'm gonna say this one more time for now, because you seem unwilling to go do your homework:  "sane people do not shoot up schools" is a complete red herring.  "Insane" means something.  Stop with the convenient broad brush.

And I'll say this one more time, because you seem unwilling to study the history of these shootings: too many of these shooters were in touch with the mental health system, were known to have set off red flags, and had far too easy access to firearms.

 The guy who shot up the movie theater in Colorado?  Had school mental health professionals who felt he was homicidal, and even told the police.  He still acquired firearms legally after that.  Virginia Tech shooter?  Same thing - mental health issues, had contact with mental health professionals who thought he was dangerous.  18 months before he killed 32 students/teachers, he was detained in a mental health facility.    He legally bought his firearms well after that.  

Hell, the Parkland guy is the very poster child of this crap - just like the others, he legally purchased a firearm well after he had been in contact with the mental health system, and had mental health professionals saying he was dangerous.

These people should not have been able to acquire firearms.    They gave off plenty of warning signs to actual mental health professionals.

[HoustonHorn 1059]

Not a researcher nor will I become one since I'm already employed full time. But I think reasonable people can observe and have hypotheses. Unless you have a study in mind that has already been done. I've tried searching and I've found a lot of different articles saying a lot of different things and referencing a lot of different studies. But I don't run in scientific circles and couldn't tell you a respectable research organization from one that is not. If you know of peer-reviewed study that addresses it, I'd be happy to read it.

[BabaYaga 15205]

21 minutes ago, HoustonHorn said:

Its easy to point at guns and say we need to figure out some reasonable measures to restrict access. That's been discussed ad nauseum here after every single event and I think most reasonable people on both sides agree some measures might be acceptable and would help to some degree. But millions of kids have some sort of access to guns and nearly all of them never consider the possibility of using them for mass murder. I'm not sure that access has materially changed over the last 30 years, although I'm sure someone will point out some statistic to say otherwise. As I said, reasonable measures should be taken, but that's a long-term solution and hopefully something that begins in earnest soon.

But beyond guns/gun access, something is making mass shootings more prevalent. I think its worth exploring those potential factors that make mass murder a viable option for an increasing number of kids

Access is vastly more difficult now.  As a child, we rode around in pickups with loaded gun racks and ate dinner mere feet from an unlocked, glass gun cabinet.  You could buy guns from magazines and hardware stores and carried guns openly in neighborhoods on the way to the creek to chase rabbits.  And this is Austin in the late 70’s BTW.  Not some small ranching town.

Guns in schools?  They all had guns in schools.  They were practiced with.  Competed with.  Classes taught with them.  Zero shootings. 

As to why?  Nobody knows.  But it’s not happening in inner city schools.  Those “prisons” that dare to have armed guards and detectors when gang shootings were threatening children.  Funny how gun registration and banning never came up then.  They locked things down.  My guess – these are copy-cat killings.  Columbine was the breaking of the 5-minute mile.  It showed what was possible.  Like it or not, those kids are famous.  Columbine is famous.  Movies were made.  And ever since we’ve seen a rash of identical sprees.  Not just in schools.  But all in gun-free zones (theatres, college campuses, military bases, schools). 

Edited May 30, 2018 by BabaYaga

[fattyflattie 4636]

3 hours ago, bad_teammate said:

This is exactly how schools should work and if you want anything different you're deranged.

The solution to this problem is not turning our society into a prison.

 

Fuck

Wait. You think anyone should be able to walk off the street into an elemenatary school, not show any ID, and have access to the entire compound? Not a police/security in sight  Walk up to a volunteer and collect a badge for full access to the school.  

Are you fucking high or just can’t read too good? 

[jimmyjazz 45537]

2 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

And I'll say this one more time, because you seem unwilling to study the history of these shootings: too many of these shooters were in touch with the mental health system, were known to have set off red flags, and had far too easy access to firearms.

"Too many" is not precise.  From MY research it appears that a majority were NOT "in touch" with the mental health system.

[BabaYaga 15205]

7 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

That would make for a great peer-reviewed scientific study.

Nobody is seemingly talking about the drugs the shooters were all taking.  Correct me, but ALL were taking some form of anti-depressant, psychotropic medication.  This also includes stabbings that few are talking about.    

[atomheartbevo 89390]

15 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

I completely agree.  It's not "normal".  It just doesn't mean that such a person would likely be diagnosed as psychotic, schizophrenic, or even depressed or bipolar.  White, male, and angry seem to be the most common characteristics, and until we lump "angry" in with "mental illness" we should be careful with language and policy.

Most people get angry everyday, and don't kill anybody, up to and including the source of their anger.  Mack Brown was able to walk freely around Campus after 5-7.

Let me ask you this: If you have somebody who has come into contact with the mental health system, and the professionals have said "this person is a danger to themselves or others", do you really have a problem with restricting their use or acquisition of firearms?  

[jimmyjazz 45537]

2 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

Let me ask you this: If you have somebody who has come into contact with the mental health system, and the professionals have said "this person is a danger to themselves or others", do you really have a problem with restricting their use or acquisition of firearms?  

No, not at all.

[fattyflattie 4636]

2 hours ago, atomheartbevo said:

When I go up to my 5 year-old's school, if it's after 8am and before dismissal, I have to be buzzed in, and I have to identify myself.  That's perfectly fine for me.

Trying to implement anything beyond that at special events or in the mornings creates a security nightmare.  A would-be shooter would love nothing more than to know exactly where there are chokepoints of several dozen kids (if not more) waiting to go through some kind of TSA-style checkpoint.  Those kids would be easy targets.

Harden the doors of the classrooms, have a cop (who isn't a chickenshit coward) at the school in a central location, somebody who is in decent shape and can actually move/respond quickly.  That would have stopped or lessened most of these shootings substantially.

I agree. My point is choke point hell, someone who wanted to do harm could have lieterally walked thru the front door, down the hall into the cafeteria where a bullshit elementary graduation was taking place, and done terrible things.  This person easily wouldn’t have encountered a teacher or a cop (didn’t see any officer the entire time).   Im talking 150’ from front door to cafeteria with one hallway and no one checking people on that path.  In fact, you actually had to go opposite way to smile at the volunteer and collect your pass, then left to the cafeteria  

Normal days you damn near have to have your birth cert to drop off a paper left at the house. But whole class congregation, fuck it open all the doors to the school. Doesn’t make sense to me but I guess let’s all yell !!!Prison!!! 

Common sense could solve a lot of this shit. 

[Brisketexan 104532]

13 minutes ago, BabaYaga said:

My guess – these are copy-cat killings.  Columbine was the breaking of the 5-minute mile.  It showed what was possible.  Like it or not, those kids are famous.  Columbine is famous.  Movies were made.  And ever since we’ve seen a rash of identical sprees.  Not just in schools.  But all in gun-free zones (theatres, college campuses, military bases, schools). 

I share your guess.  I think that really is the "moment of change."  History is full of social patterns.  It seems callous to call it a trend or fad, but fundamentally, the psychology is the same.  Hell, I was just having this conversation with a colleague; why in the HELL did we wear acid-washed jeans back in the day?  Especially with the cuffs rolled up tight?  It looked ridiculous, objectively.  But....trend, and social inertia.  

In this case, among particularly vulnerable/angry/unstable males, there is a trend that gets some inertia.  They are sick of being nobodies, of being ignored.  There's an easy, tested recipe out there for being noticed now: pull a Columbine.

I really think there's a lot to that.  Which is scary in and of itself, because it's something as simple as social example and pressure.

10 minutes ago, BabaYaga said:

Nobody is seemingly talking about the drugs the shooters were all taking.  Correct me, but ALL were taking some form of anti-depressant, psychotropic medication.  This also includes stabbings that few are talking about.    

Oh, people are talking about this.  The problem I have ALWAYS had with the point is the chicken-egg problem.  It's like saying "almost everyone who dies of cancer has received chemo in the past 6 months!  It's the CHEMO THAT'S KILLING THEM!"

In these cases, I suspect that most/all of the people who were on such meds and committed a shooting were placed on the meds because they were ALREADY exhibiting behaviors and personality traits that put them at risk, and the drugs were prescribed as a RESPONSE.  That is, it's not that the drugs were a cause, but rather, they were a preventative measure that failed.  And I'm not saying this as someone who is all on board with how we prescribe medication, etc.  I just see it tossed out as a convenient answer, and I'll be honest, the kind of folks who typically toss it out are the type of folks who you shake your head and say "well of course that moonbat thinks that."  I have no problem with any comprehensive examination of the school shooting phenomenon also looking at drug regimens -- shit, I'd think it would be inherent in examining mental health history, and timing.  I just don't buy the causation hypothesis.

[BabaYaga 15205]

15 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

Mack Brown was able to walk freely around Campus after 5-7.

Triggered......

[Bat Guano 359]

24 minutes ago, BabaYaga said:

Access is vastly more difficult now.  As a child, we rode around in pickups with loaded gun racks and ate dinner mere feet from an unlocked, glass gun cabinet.  You could buy guns from magazines and hardware stores and carried guns openly in neighborhoods on the way to the creek to chase rabbits.  And this is Austin in the late 70’s BTW.  Not some small ranching town.

Guns in schools?  They all had guns in schools.  They were practiced with.  Competed with.  Classes taught with them.  Zero shootings. 

As to why?  Nobody knows.  But it’s not happening in inner city schools.  Those “prisons” that dare to have armed guards and detectors when gang shootings were threatening children.  Funny how gun registration and banning never came up then.  They locked things down.  My guess – these are copy-cat killings.  Columbine was the breaking of the 5-minute mile.  It showed what was possible.  Like it or not, those kids are famous.  Columbine is famous.  Movies were made.  And ever since we’ve seen a rash of identical sprees.  Not just in schools.  But all in gun-free zones (theatres, college campuses, military bases, schools). 

Yup. They're calling themselves 'Columbiners.' It's a real thing.

For ‘Columbiners,’ School Shootings Have a Deadly Allure

 

Quote

By Manny Fernandez, Julie Turkewitz and Jess Bidgood

• May 30, 2018

SANTA FE, Tex. — The exact reasons why a teenage gunman shot his fellow students and teachers here at Santa Fe High School remain a mystery. His model for carrying it out is more clear.

The 17-year-old junior wore a black trench coat and fired a sawed-off shotgun, the same attire and weaponry used by the two gunmen who killed a dozen students and a teacher at Columbine High School in Colorado in 1999.

He wore a T-shirt with the phrase “Born to Kill” on it in bold, similar in design to those worn by the Columbine attackers, which read “Wrath” and “Natural Selection.”

His crude arsenal included canisters of carbon-dioxide gas and Molotov cocktails, two types of explosives used by the Columbine gunmen.

The picture he had posted of his trench coat on Facebook showed a small red-star medallion with the Communist hammer-and-sickle on the collar, the same type of button a Columbine gunman attached to his boot.

It was not the first time a high school suddenly engulfed in gunfire and death found itself looking for clues in the random symbology of a nearly 20-year-old mass shooting that has become, it seems, the standard by which youthful gunmen across America have come to measure themselves.

The 20-year-old attacker who killed 26 people at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut in 2012 had compiled an enormous mass-murder spreadsheet and materials on the Columbine attackers on his computer, including what appeared to be a complete copy of the official Columbine investigation.

 

 

[Brisketexan 104532]

11 minutes ago, fattyflattie said:

I agree. My point is choke point hell, someone who wanted to do harm could have lieterally walked thru the front door, down the hall into the cafeteria where a bullshit elementary graduation was taking place, and done terrible things.  This person easily wouldn’t have encountered a teacher or a cop (didn’t see any officer the entire time).   Im talking 150’ from front door to cafeteria with one hallway and no one checking people on that path.  In fact, you actually had to go opposite way to smile at the volunteer and collect your pass, then left to the cafeteria  

Normal days you damn near have to have your birth cert to drop off a paper left at the house. But whole class congregation, fuck it open all the doors to the school. Doesn’t make sense to me but I guess let’s all yell !!!Prison!!! 

Common sense could solve a lot of this shit. 

Here's the horrific truth: there's essentially nothing that can stop a creative, determined shooter.

It's a realization I came to years ago, after 9/11, when we started really looking at vulnerabilities to terrorists.  I won't go into detail here, but I looked around and realized that I could, quite easily, kill hundreds of people and/or cripple crucial infrastructure with some simple (albeit large) explosive devices.  We just can't harden everything -- we can't.  We can't protect every bridge over the Colorado river, for example.

Instead, we have to take the best, reasonable measures that we can, which reduce the odds, make it harder, etc.

It's the same way I look at driving.  My wife and I are good drivers.  We drive good, safe, well-maintained vehicles, with top-end safety equipment.  We are as safe as we can be.  But I also know that at any instance, she or I could get that phone call -- a truck jumped the median, there was no avoiding it, he/she is dead.  There's no way to be perfectly, 100% death-proof on the road.  Or terrorist-proof.  Or school shooter-proof.  Instead, we just do what we can to lower the risk.

[HoustonHorn 1059]

3 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

I share your guess.  I think that really is the "moment of change."  History is full of social patterns.  It seems callous to call it a trend or fad, but fundamentally, the psychology is the same.  Hell, I was just having this conversation with a colleague; why in the HELL did we wear acid-washed jeans back in the day?  Especially with the cuffs rolled up tight?  It looked ridiculous, objectively.  But....trend, and social inertia.  

In this case, among particularly vulnerable/angry/unstable males, there is a trend that gets some inertia.  They are sick of being nobodies, of being ignored.  There's an easy, tested recipe out there for being noticed now: pull a Columbine.

I really think there's a lot to that.  Which is scary in and of itself, because it's something as simple as social example and pressure.

Oh, people are talking about this.  The problem I have ALWAYS had with the point is the chicken-egg problem.  It's like saying "almost everyone who dies of cancer has received chemo in the past 6 months!  It's the CHEMO THAT'S KILLING THEM!"

In these cases, I suspect that most/all of the people who were on such meds and committed a shooting were placed on the meds because they were ALREADY exhibiting behaviors and personality traits that put them at risk, and the drugs were prescribed as a RESPONSE.  That is, it's not that the drugs were a cause, but rather, they were a preventative measure that failed.  And I'm not saying this as someone who is all on board with how we prescribe medication, etc.  I just see it tossed out as a convenient answer, and I'll be honest, the kind of folks who typically toss it out are the type of folks who you shake your head and say "well of course that moonbat thinks that."  I have no problem with any comprehensive examination of the school shooting phenomenon also looking at drug regimens -- shit, I'd think it would be inherent in examining mental health history, and timing.  I just don't buy the causation hypothesis. 

Really good post. I do think the copycat factor definitely plays a role and with the number of guns available it is pretty easy to duplicate in the United States. But a person is only going to copycat if they are already feeling angry/unstable/etc.

[HoustonHorn 1059]

Very interesting.

As Brisket said though, there's no way to fully stop it 100%. Its impossible.

I think a multi-faceted approach of reasonable gun control laws and studies to determine what is leading to the increased number of alienated/angry young people so that we can effectively address both issues.

 

3 minutes ago, Bat Guano said: