Ten dead, once more. Poor goddamned people.
Boulder, huh?
Fitting, let the never ending dance of 'gun control' start anew.
Push that Boulder uphil, sisyphus. Watch it come crashing down. And round and round we go, spilling blood and wasting lives.
For such smart Creatures, we're really dumb as a collective, aren't we?
Quote from: Mr.Obvious on March 23, 2021, 04:23:32 PM
Ten dead, once more. Poor goddamned people.
Boulder, huh?
Fitting, let the never ending dance of 'gun control' start anew.
Push that Boulder uphil, sisyphus. Watch it come crashing down. And round and round we go, spilling blood and wasting lives.
For such smart Creatures, we're really dumb as a collective, aren't we?
Especially if the 'collective' you are talking about happens to be the USA.
Nothing is going to change unless the law changes.
Quote from: Hydra009 on March 23, 2021, 05:28:45 PM
Nothing is going to change unless the law changes.
Yes. Additionally, nothing is going to change unless the culture changes. There are Americans whose sincere response to this shooting is for everyone to be armed. Many Americans feel it is perfectly acceptable to stand their ground and shoot people if they perceive themselves to be threatened. It's the first response to a perceived physical threat. I've asked people who own guns for protection if they considered non-lethal weapons and the answer is often no. I've asked if they have a home security system or motion sensor lights or security doors. Nope... but they have a gun. How many times when gun control measures in other countries are proposed in the US the response is "that won't work here."
This year is as bad as 2020, with these shootings an China, North Korea, and Russia being giant dicks.
(https://i.pinimg.com/originals/a6/50/20/a65020ea6834e6f6634463a70a128f0f.jpg)
Quote from: GSOgymrat on March 23, 2021, 05:54:41 PM
Yes. Additionally, nothing is going to change unless the culture changes. There are Americans whose sincere response to this shooting is for everyone to be armed. Many Americans feel it is perfectly acceptable to stand their ground and shoot people if they perceive themselves to be threatened. It's the first response to a perceived physical threat. I've asked people who own guns for protection if they considered non-lethal weapons and the answer is often no. I've asked if they have a home security system or motion sensor lights or security doors. Nope... but they have a gun. How many times when gun control measures in other countries are proposed in the US the response is "that won't work here."
Too young and too big. How many countries are there in the States, and how many cultures and sub cultures in them?
It's just about one place I guess, but when I first learned about the 'land rush' concept, I was pretty young and it blew my mind. I was like 'Wut?' :lol: I mean the country I live in, the republic (which is dead now) is a hundred years old, and the empire before that was just 600 years old, but groups of Turks have lived in Anatolia alone for a thousand years and before that in central Asia and around have changed places back in thousands of years more. Turkic poeple in general... Similar peoples with similar culture have been fighting each other since time immemorial. The historical structures, esp. religous structures have changed hands so many times, there are mosques built on churches built on ancient temples built on sacred places before that. There isn't a road or piece of dirt that isn't trodded on, some ruins that weren't built over and over again. There is no new land. Hasn't been any for sooo long a time. There are still land lords and tribes...that's why it keeps falling backwards.
But Americas. Esp the North America...Even though the most of the land is uninhabitable, there were no established arhcitectural, written culture when white Europeans invaded the land. Nothing but vast open space. How do you survive in a land like that? You get armed and you get extremely territorial. The land. You own up to it and fight for it to death. Your ancestors have shot horse thieves and whoever tresspass or threatened their land. Was there another way? Now they probably shoot car thieves and anyone gets into their property exactly the same. If this culture hadn't evolved this way, would there have been an America? Is it good, bad? From whose point of view?
Yeah, colonies had 'owners' in Europe before independence, but it must have been a real jungle for a very long time and that culture looks like it's still alive. How long has it been really? 200 years the most? Less? It's a very little amount of time for a new land and culture.
I have no idea. But American culture always looked too tough to me. Competititon is too harsh. Culture is too harsh on its people and so the people are too harsh on each other considering the opportunities the have. And so are the rules. It's cut off from the world. I might be wrong of course, but it looks like when you drop below a certain bar in the US, it is almost impossible to come back. It looks like the culture have less shades of grey, more black and white compared to the old world.
Quote from: drunkenshoe on March 24, 2021, 06:35:33 AM
Too young and too big. How many countries are there in the States, and how many cultures and sub cultures in them?
But Americas. Esp the North America...Even though the most of the land is uninhabitable, there were no established arhcitectural, written culture when white Europeans invaded the land. Nothing but vast open space. How do you survive in a land like that? You get armed and you get extremely territorial. The land. You own up to it and fight for it to death. Your ancestors have shot horse thieves and whoever tresspass or threatened their land. Was there another way? Now they probably shoot car thieves and anyone gets into their property exactly the same. If this culture hadn't evolved this way, would there have been an America? Is it good, bad? From whose point of view?
Yeah, colonies had 'owners' in Europe before independence, but it must have been a real jungle for a very long time and that culture looks like it's still alive. How long has it been really? 200 years the most? Less? It's a very little amount of time for a new land and culture.
A comparison between Australia and North America would be interesting. Both were colonized by Europeans, Australia later than North America.
Per 100,000 people:
Homicide rate: USA=4.96, Australia=0.89
Firearm-related death rate: USA=12.21, Australia=1.04
Suicide rate: USA=13.7, Australia=11.7
(https://i.pinimg.com/736x/c0/91/c5/c091c51729bf35dba237ffb05563ddab.jpg)
Of course, just looking at statistics doesn't mean much. It would be interesting to read a comparison of how each culture evolved in terms of government, violence, and conflict.
Quote from: drunkenshoe on March 24, 2021, 06:35:33 AM
But American culture always looked too tough to me. Competititon is too harsh. Culture is too harsh on its people and so the people are too harsh on each other considering the opportunities the have. And so are the rules. It's cut off from the world. I might be wrong of course, but it looks like when you drop below a certain bar in the US, it is almost impossible to come back. It looks like the culture have less shades of grey, more black and white compared to the old world.
I think American culture is generally more individualistic and competitive than many other cultures. We say we are family-oriented but typically multiple generations don't live in the same household or even the same city. Starting at birth, we want our kids in the best daycare, the best school, the best peer group, the best sports team, the best college, the best career... "Average" is a pejorative. We are a nation of loud, glorious winners and silent, tragic losers.
Quote from: GSOgymrat on March 24, 2021, 09:38:00 AMOf course, just looking at statistics doesn't mean much. It would be interesting to read a comparison of how each culture evolved in terms of government, violence, and conflict.
Australia had a particularly horrific mass shooting at Port Arthur (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_laws_of_Australia#Port_Arthur_massacre) and as a result, adopted much stricter gun laws.
The USA, in contrast, suffers horrific mass shootings on the regular and adopted upside-down graphs that make the problem look less like a problem.
(https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/h5MSdPM97fm55kTk4kk4P7-1200-80.jpg)
Quote from: GSOgymrat on March 24, 2021, 09:38:00 AM
...I think American culture is generally more individualistic and competitive than many other cultures. We say we are family-oriented but typically multiple generations don't live in the same household or even the same city. Starting at birth, we want our kids in the best daycare, the best school, the best peer group, the best sports team, the best college, the best career... "Average" is a pejorative. We are a nation of loud, glorious winners and silent, tragic losers.
Agreed. I don't think you are family oriented in a different way. The general human culture defines being family oriented as something positive and I think that is the reason peoples, cultures like to think they are. I don't agree that being family oriented is a 'good' thing for a society considering almost no culture in the world is free from some level of religious or nationalist indoctrination in childhood. Esp. religion.
For American culture, the freedom and some sort of an American dream...etc. seems to be highly functional -at least as a motivation- in domestic level. So people leave their families at a young age, to get into to the competition, but also the hot zones in the jungle are the places they can live their lives with their own identities and beliefs, free and away from what they were born into - which is something we can't choose. That's a pretty big motivation for a lot of groups. Also these people are the people who push and preserve these places with those higher standards.
Now, this is technically the same everywhere around the world, but as the US is so huge, diverse and practically made of different many countries where the competititon is too high, the big pic is different than other places, imo. You need to travel hours with a plane, not hours with a car or a bus to reach your family. This is pretty important. Because domestic travel in the US means serious time, money and planning beforehand. (If we want to visit some family in another city, we jump in a car and drive for 5 hours, that's it. I travel for an hour to see my parents at the summer house, and there is commercial transportation at every hour. The longest distance in the country is 2 hours by plane.)
That transforms the human, family relationships and connections strongly, and probably the American culture evolved in a more individualistic way also because of this. And it probably contributed to the over all 'professionalism'. Most people do not care how their offspring lives as long as they are healthy and fine. And this vision requires nontribal human connections, pushes the family culture to be that way. Yes, it also puts a natural distance between all people, but I don't agree that it is something bad. It's pretty good actually. Because in opposite, so called warm and hospitable cultures that warmth and hospitality have a price. You know what it is. People are living in each other's lives, parents and people in powerful positions in groups, dictate, oppress, even harm and injure, kill others. It's a big scale with shades of greys and black. (This exists in secular groups too.) So it is bullshit. It's shit. If you are not living in that majority, you are naturally alienated. Yeah it's much better than the option imo, but far less practical in many ways.
So it is a good cultural trait in my opinion.
Many Americans only think of gun ownership in terms of rights and not public health. Organizations such as the NRA have promoted legislation to specifically prevent gun violence being studied as a public health issue. The NRA pushed through the Dickey amendment a provision inserted a rider into the 1996 United States federal government omnibus spending bill which mandated that "none of the funds made available for injury prevention and control at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) may be used to advocate or promote gun control." Enforcement of this has gone back and forth. Fortunately, in 2018 Congressional negotiators reached a deal for the fiscal year 2020 federal budget included $25 million for the CDC and NIH to research reducing gun-related deaths and injuries, the first such funding since 1996. In 2011 Florida passed a law restricting doctors from discussing firearms with patients, which has fortunately been found to be unconstitutional. There are other examples of how a segment of Americans are concerned with protecting the right to own firearms regardless of the consequences for public health.
On the topic of guns and public health, according to the CDC, 62% of gun deaths in the US are suicides. When it comes to suicide, having a gun in your home is essentially like having a suicide pill. It’s a pill that doesn’t require a prescription and you can buy as many as you like. People often leave their suicide pills on nightstands or unlocked cabinets where anyone, including children, could get them. In fact, suicide pills could be used to kill other members of the householdâ€"have a fight with your wife and slip it in her morning coffee. If you asked a sensible person if it is a good idea for people who suffer from depression with suicidal ideation, a history of suicide attempts, or impulse control issues to have suicide pills readily available they would probably agree this isn’t a good idea. Yet many people don’t think of guns this way.
I was thirteen when our neighbor blew his brains out with a shotgun. His wife came over and ask me to check on him. (I was the oldest male in easy reach I guess.) Still remember the splatter pattern on the wall.
Quote from: Gawdzilla Sama on March 25, 2021, 12:23:23 PM
I was thirteen when our neighbor blew his brains out with a shotgun. His wife came over and ask me to check on him. (I was the oldest male in easy reach I guess.) Still remember the splatter pattern on the wall.
That's horrible for anyone but especially at your age.
Yeah...it is horrible. I wondered if she was scared he'd shoot her, but she should have heard the sound I guess. Maybe she thought in any case, he wouldn't harm him or something like that.
Quote from: drunkenshoe on March 25, 2021, 01:43:47 PM
Yeah...it is horrible. I wondered if she was scared he'd shoot her, but she should have heard the sound I guess. Maybe she thought in any case, he wouldn't harm him or something like that.
She knew he was dead, but she didn't want to see the mess. "I could remember him as he was the last time I saw him alive."
Thanks, lady.
Quote from: Gawdzilla Sama on March 25, 2021, 02:55:39 PM
She knew he was dead, but she didn't want to see the mess. "I could remember him as he was the last time I saw him alive."
Thanks, lady.
That is what law enforcement and EMS are for. I'm sorry you suffered due of her incompetence and complete lack of empathy.
So, she perfectly knew what she was doing. Didn't they ask her to identify him officially in the end? Well, who knows how it worked then... Call the authority, run to the neighbours. Scream, cry... Who thinks about going and finding a child for this? Fucking piece fo shit.
Quote from: GSOgymrat on March 25, 2021, 03:22:24 PM
That is what law enforcement and EMS are for. I'm sorry you suffered due of her incompetence and complete lack of empathy.
She had no clue the police should be called. The upshot of that was a 13 yo calling the police and being asked to describe the scene. (They wanted to be sure it wasn't a prank call.) They got to listen to me power puking.
Quote from: drunkenshoe on March 26, 2021, 04:56:02 AM
So, she perfectly knew what she was doing. Didn't they ask her to identify him officially in the end? Well, who knows how it worked then... Call the authority, run to the neighbours. Scream, cry... Who thinks about going and finding a child for this? Fucking piece fo shit.
She was just a person who was faced with circumstances she wasn't equipped for. Until you're tested you don't know how you'll react.
Quote from: Gawdzilla Sama on March 26, 2021, 07:57:01 AM
She was just a person who was faced with circumstances she wasn't equipped for. Until you're tested you don't know how you'll react.
Oh, I'm sure I'd be terrible. I'd scream and faint, try to run away, hide... have a panic attack. But I know I wouldn't go and look for a minor to ask him to go in there, if I can walk and talk.
Quote from: drunkenshoe on March 26, 2021, 12:14:44 PM
Oh, I'm sure I'd be terrible. I'd scream and faint, try to run away, hide... have a panic attack. But I know I wouldn't go and look for a minor to ask him to go in there, if I can walk and talk.
Thinking wasn't involved.
Quote from: Gawdzilla Sama on March 25, 2021, 12:23:23 PM
I was thirteen when our neighbor blew his brains out with a shotgun. His wife came over and ask me to check on him. (I was the oldest male in easy reach I guess.) Still remember the splatter pattern on the wall.
Yeah. Some memories linger in the back of your mind quietly, unheard, until something like this brings it back. My best buddy and roommate had his feet crushed in a construction accident, unable to get his infection under control they removed both legs to the knee. He was pretty depressed for awhile but started to get more optimistic after about four months. Asked me to build him a small paint booth so he could work on his paint designs for car hoods. I did, two weeks later on the day where he was supposed to have married my sister he took my grandfathers shotgun into the booth. He was a nice guy like that.
Quote from: Gawdzilla Sama on March 26, 2021, 01:03:52 PM
Thinking wasn't involved.
Could she have looked for an adult for help instead of you? From what you said it sounded like she could have, but looked for you deliberately. Asking for help in those kind of situations is something people do reflexively if they are able, without thinking. We run for help, scream, cry, get in shock, freeze, faint, shit ourselves...whatever. In that case, we don't
choose who to go, or esp. look for someone least likely to help us, and ask them to enter somewhere to check a dead body because we don't want to remember the dead person that way. Esp. when we know what happened most likely. If somebody is acting that way, there is probably thinking involved.
Yes, I get that it was 60 years ago; a completely different world, time and place. But her thinking of looking for a male child seems like a very specific kind of concern to me. An adult going in there first, a neighbour likely, would talk about it afterwards many times, but a child is different. A child doesn't tell a story from first hand to everyone who would listen over and over again. I doubt if he would talk about it. Even if he did, it is again different. Adults are completely a different matter. They would repeat and elaborate, illustrate, add to the story. An adult doing the same thing has different consequences. Have you ever thought about it that way?
I'm sorry. I don't find her reaction as 'natural' as you do.
Quote from: aitm on March 26, 2021, 01:28:17 PM
Yeah. Some memories linger in the back of your mind quietly, unheard, until something like this brings it back. My best buddy and roommate had his feet crushed in a construction accident, unable to get his infection under control they removed both legs to the knee. He was pretty depressed for awhile but started to get more optimistic after about four months. Asked me to build him a small paint booth so he could work on his paint designs for car hoods. I did, two weeks later on the day where he was supposed to have married my sister he took my grandfathers shotgun into the booth. He was a nice guy like that.
Oh...that's very sad. It must have been very painful for his family and all of you.
Quote from: drunkenshoe on March 26, 2021, 02:15:25 PM
I'm sorry. I don't find her reaction as 'natural' as you do.
I was there.
Another one tonight, Virginia Beach, 3 dead and 9 in critical condition.
Like clockwork. A routine common enough it's just an afterthought.
I used to keep my guns in gun safes. When my mother moved in with me I evaluated the situation.
1. Old lady with ALZ.
2. Me, not a perfect human being.
3. Possibility Mom would get hold of a gun eventually. (She was avid hunter and dead shot.)
4. Distance was needed.
5. I offered my collection to the Smitty. (All guns connected to the USN in some fashion with a bias toward guns that had known action in the Civil War, WWI and WWII, Korea and Vietnam.) They accepted them on a "trade forward basis", free to trade for items they were missing in their collection.
If every gun owner kept their guns safely there would be a dearth of "illegally obtained" guns.
Quote from: Shiranu on March 27, 2021, 05:04:34 AM
Another one tonight, Virginia Beach, 3 dead and 9 in critical condition.
Like clockwork. A routine common enough it's just an afterthought.
Shootings are simply part of the landscape of our society. Hardly any notice--a one or two day interest. Hardly any offers of even thoughts and prayers and no serious thoughts of gun control of any kind; just part and parcel of living in the USA.
Quote from: GSOgymrat on March 23, 2021, 05:54:41 PM
Yes. Additionally, nothing is going to change unless the culture changes. There are Americans whose sincere response to this shooting is for everyone to be armed. Many Americans feel it is perfectly acceptable to stand their ground and shoot people if they perceive themselves to be threatened. It's the first response to a perceived physical threat. I've asked people who own guns for protection if they considered non-lethal weapons and the answer is often no. I've asked if they have a home security system or motion sensor lights or security doors. Nope... but they have a gun. How many times when gun control measures in other countries are proposed in the US the response is "that won't work here."
All of this.
Quote from: Mike Cl on March 27, 2021, 09:14:31 AM
Shootings are simply part of the landscape of our society. Hardly any notice--a one or two day interest. Hardly any offers of even thoughts and prayers and no serious thoughts of gun control of any kind; just part and parcel of living in the USA.
4 people, including a child, dead in shooting at Southern California office building; suspect injured (https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2021/03/31/orange-california-shooting-4-dead-including-child-suspect-injured/4831701001/)
Four people, including a child, are dead after a suspect opened fire at an office building in Southern California, according to police.
Details were scarce late Wednesday regarding the incident in Orange, California, but Orange Police Department Lt. Jen Amat told reporters at the scene four people died and the suspect in the shooting was injured and taken to a local hospital and is in critical condition. Officers recovered one gun, she said.
One woman was injured and hospitalized in critical condition, Amat said. Both the woman and the suspect suffered gunshot wounds, Amat said. She added she didn't know if the suspect's wound "is self-inflicted or not."
There was no additional information about the suspect or the victims. Amat stressed there was no ongoing threat to the public and had no information about weapons found at the scene.
Quote from: GSOgymrat on April 01, 2021, 06:31:48 AM
4 people, including a child, dead in shooting at Southern California office building; suspect injured (https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2021/03/31/orange-california-shooting-4-dead-including-child-suspect-injured/4831701001/)
Four people, including a child, are dead after a suspect opened fire at an office building in Southern California, according to police.
Details were scarce late Wednesday regarding the incident in Orange, California, but Orange Police Department Lt. Jen Amat told reporters at the scene four people died and the suspect in the shooting was injured and taken to a local hospital and is in critical condition. Officers recovered one gun, she said.
One woman was injured and hospitalized in critical condition, Amat said. Both the woman and the suspect suffered gunshot wounds, Amat said. She added she didn't know if the suspect's wound "is self-inflicted or not."
There was no additional information about the suspect or the victims. Amat stressed there was no ongoing threat to the public and had no information about weapons found at the scene.
And The Beat Goes On..................................!!!!!
https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/01/us/two-weeks-20-mass-shootings-trnd/index.html
QuoteTwo weeks have passed since the three Atlanta-area spa shootings claimed the lives of eight people, and in that time at least 20 other mass shootings have taken place.
At least seven mass shootings occurred in the week between the attacks in Atlanta and in a grocery store in Boulder, Colorado. In the week that followed, that number more than doubled.
It happens so often, even the news is like, "Fuck, this is too much even for us.".
It just goes on and on...and now we have another event in Brooklyn Center Minn. that some are calling execution by cop...
It seems like almost every day people die from shootings. Thoughts and prayers are not even offered any more. It has become so common that it is simply part of who and what we are as a society.
"Suspect in mass shooting at Orange, California, business complex knew the victims, police say"
https://www.cnn.com/2021/03/31/us/orange-california-shooting/index.html