Mass shootings and gun violence are happening way too often

[fraurosena]

It may be incredibly cynical of me to start a whole thread only to discuss mass shootings and gun violence, but it means we won't have to start a new thread every time gun related shit happens again. It is my sincere hope that this thread will not be used all that often, but... there was a mass shooting again today. This time in a church in Texas, with upwards of 20 people killed, including children. 

 

 

[GrumpyGran]

27 minutes ago, fraurosena said:

It may be incredibly cynical of me to start a whole thread only to discuss mass shootings and gun violence, but it means we won't have to start a new thread every time gun related shit happens again. It is my sincere hope that this thread will not be used all that often, but... there was a mass shooting again today. This time in a church in Texas, with upwards of 20 people killed, including children. 

 

 

I think it's up to 27 now. You just don't want to know what people are saying about this on line. We have become a very violent country.

[Destiny]

Sigh. Just...sigh.

[JMarie]

Unless the laws and/or mindset change, there's no reason to believe this kind of situation will become rarer.  If, following yet another mass shooting, elected officials don't want to discuss reasonable compromise, then when???

[onekidanddone]

5 minutes ago, JMarie said:

Unless the laws and/or mindset change, there's no reason to believe this kind of situation will become rarer.  If, following yet another mass shooting, elected officials don't want to discuss reasonable compromise, then when???

A school full of first graders were slaughtered and after a few "thoughts and prayers" they didn't give a shit. Alex Jones, one of Trump's favorite people promoted the story that the murder of tiny children was fake. I have no hope that anybody cares.

[Destiny]

Just now, onekidanddone said:

I have no hope that anybody cares.

I want to care. I really, really, really fucking do, but why bother when we will just do another round of fucking thoughts and prayers, and then the NRA will go back to Uzis for toddlers cos MURICA!

[Smoochie]

Why is this not being reported as what it really is ... terrorism.  Donald was awfully quick to jump on the attack in New York as terrorism or any other country, so I'm going to suppose here that this was a white man, thus, not terrorism.  Annnnd of course this is not the right time to talk about gun control .... guns for all & everyone, no restrictions!

Whoops, forgot the second part of my rant ... where was Donald's call of terrorism and the death penalty for the Walmart shooter?  Hmmmmm, wonder why, whatever could the difference be?

 

[onekidanddone]

15 minutes ago, Smoochie said:

Why is this not being reported as what it really is ... terrorism.  Donald was awfully quick to jump on the attack in New York as terrorism or any other country, so I'm going to suppose here that this was a white man, thus, not terrorism.  Annnnd of course this is not the right time to talk about gun control .... guns for all & everyone, no restrictions!

Whoops, forgot the second part of my rant ... where was Donald's call of terrorism and the death penalty for the Walmart shooter?  Hmmmmm, wonder why, whatever could the difference be?

White shooter = lone wolf.  Brown shooter = terrorist!  I see he is not calling for all the white men who kill to be shipped off to Guantanamo.  They are his base after all. 

[K'Z'K]

If the shooter was white, he was a lone psychopath. Or it didn't really happen (see: Sandy Hook).

If the shooter was Middle Eastern and/or Muslim, he was a terrorist and we must deport all Middle Easterns and Muslims.

If the shooter was Latino, he was Mexican and you all know what that means. Build the wall!

If the shooter was black, he was a thug and an example of all that's wrong with the Inner Cities and black-on-black crime.

No matter who the shooter was, we ( = white people, the rest of you don't count) must get MORE guns. As comedian Bill Hicks once said, "There is no connection between having a gun and shooting someone, and NOT having a gun and NOT shooting someone. No connection whatsoever."

[I hope everyone reading this can feel the bitter sarcasm dripping off the screen. It's how I cope.]

@onekidanddone jinx!

[Rachel333]

I actually noticed that a lot of people in the media used "lone wolf" to describe the attacker in New York last week, and I remember the guy in the Sydney siege being called that as well, even though both were Muslim. It's absolutely true though that there are a lot of differences in how a white, non-Muslim criminal is described vs. other criminals.

[Palimpsest]

I feel so sick.  I can't put my thoughts into the right words right now. 

[Destiny]

White shooter = lone wolf.  Brown shooter = terrorist!  I see he is not calling for all the white men who kill to be shipped off to Guantanamo.  They are his base after all. 

You beat me to it!

[WiseGirl]

 the Vicki Soto 5k was this weekend.

Nothing has changed since those babies were murdered and it makes me so sad.

[Ali]

1 hour ago, Smoochie said:

Annnnd of course this is not the right time to talk about gun control .... guns for all & everyone, no restrictions!

It is the time to talk about gun free zones being eliminated because that would solve everything. (Sarcasm font.)

[smittykins]

Besides, Jim Jones killed 900 people with a pitcher of Kool Aid!

(I actually saw that on FB.)

[OtterRuletheWorld]

The media is now reporting the name of the shooter. I am not sure if it has been officially verified yet.

https://heavy.com/news/2017/11/devin-kelley-p-sutherland-springs-church-shooter-patrick-kelly/

[onekidanddone]

12 minutes ago, smittykins said:

Besides, Jim Jones killed 900 people with a pitcher of Kool Aid!

(I actually saw that on FB.)

I was in middle school when Jones Town went down.

12 minutes ago, OtterRuletheWorld said:

The media is now reporting the name of the shooter. I am not sure if it has been officially verified yet.

https://heavy.com/news/2017/11/devin-kelley-p-sutherland-springs-church-shooter-patrick-kelly/

It was also reported that a citizen carrying his own gun took him down. This will just prove to the TDs that GUNS FOR ALL is a really good idea.

[OtterRuletheWorld]

1 minute ago, onekidanddone said:

I was in middle school when Jones Town went down.

It was also reported that a citizen carrying his own gun took him down. This will just prove to the TDs that GUNS FOR ALL is a really good idea.

Reported shooter received a dishonorable discharge in 2014, meaning he was not allowed to posses a firearm.

[neurogirl]

With my scientist hat on, it seems that mass shootings are a feed-forward loop. Our brains often repeat what we think of often, and if some crazy person hears about mass shootings and the infamy that goes along with it, that idea could become a real possibility.

I don't know if I'm making any sense. I just reread about Sandy Hook and feel utterly shaky and sick. If THAT didn't bring the NRA and NRA-owned politicians to their senses, I don't think anything will. And since the Las Vegas shootings I haven't been able to be at a public event or large lecture without imagining a gunman entering and how I would escape. It's truly becoming a part of our American psyche and almost nothing is more heartbreaking.

[kacarlton]

I continue to pray for the day that the GOP Thugs will care as much about living, talking, breathing human beings as they do about fetuses.

[StepMonsterInLA]

I am a recovering republican and I want all of the lawmakers to consciously put semi auto weapons and ammo in the hands of mentally ill Americans. 72 hour hold?  Here ya go.  And place the distribution centers right next to the Capitol building. With kiosks next to where your grandkids go to school, which is across the street where your daughter works. I am sickened by “rights”. We have the right to peaceful congregation and freedom of worship and the gunman has a right to possess assault weapons. 

[Rachel333]

18 minutes ago, neurogirl said:

With my scientist hat on, it seems that mass shootings are a feed-forward loop. Our brains often repeat what we think of often, and if some crazy person hears about mass shootings and the infamy that goes along with it, that idea could become a real possibility.

There was a really interesting New Yorker article about contagion with school shootings that compared them to riots.

Quote

A riot was a social process, in which people did things in reaction to and in combination with those around them. Social processes are driven by our thresholds—which he defined as the number of people who need to be doing some activity before we agree to join them.

It uses the example of a potential school shooter who didn't seem to actually be all that committed to his plan as someone who would have a fairly high threshold for that kind of violence but was immersed in a culture that gives a sort of script for such shootings.

Quote

In the day of Eric Harris, we could try to console ourselves with the thought that there was nothing we could do, that no law or intervention or restrictions on guns could make a difference in the face of someone so evil. But the riot has now engulfed the boys who were once content to play with chemistry sets in the basement. The problem is not that there is an endless supply of deeply disturbed young men who are willing to contemplate horrific acts. It’s worse. It’s that young men no longer need to be deeply disturbed to contemplate horrific acts.

 

[laPapessaGiovanna]

3 hours ago, OtterRuletheWorld said:

Reported shooter received a dishonorable discharge in 2014, meaning he was not allowed to posses a firearm.

But it doesn't matter because there's a YUGE gun proliferation problem. Oops, nevermind, that's just fake news, the truth is that gun control laws don't work so better not have laws at all. /sarcasm

[RosyDaisy]

A huge part of the problem is that we can't enforce the gun laws we do have. That's where we need to start....ENFORCEMENT.

[kacarlton]

Multiple sources are reporting that the gunman legally purchased his assault weapon in spite of his military discharge status. There is a huge problem in this country.