Why There Are Piles Of Dead Bodies At Virginia Tech
April 16, 2007
How is possible that at least one gunman shot and killed at least 22 people and wounded 21?
What is it about our culture and society that what was once thought unthinkable, has become an epidemic, with schools becoming killing fields?
Some will blame guns, but in truth, those who do that are only concerned about their own political agenda.
Switzerland and Israel are both countries with guns in every home, because of mandatory military service and reserve duty obligation In every household in those countries, there are guns. Nevertheless, the kind of gun violence we have just witnessed at Virgian Tech, at Columbine or other places, are unheard of in those places.
The escalation of gun violence and the kind of hate to leads to that kind of violence in this country is can be attributed to one cause and one cause alone.
When violence or threats of violence are considered legitimate forms of political or social expression, inevitably violence or threats of violence will manifest themselves.Terror has becomes an accepted form of political and social expression, that status granted by those who most profess to be non violent or peaceful.
The terror we see here has it’s origins in faraway places brought to our TV screens every day.
Those in this country who defend, apologize and legitimize the terror and evil committed elsewhere have facilitated the introduction of terror in this country. They will sooner defend the perpetration of evil and violence than those who would fight that evil ideology that embraces that kind of evil.
They are the most evil people, no matter how much they profess to ‘love peace.’ They are like whores, insisting that they and they alone are qualified to talk about family values.
No amount of dancing can change that reality.
April 16, 2007 at 1:05 PM
Has Sarah Brady started her media-pimping yer?
April 16, 2007 at 3:10 PM
And has anybody identified the perp? On the newsfeeds, his name “has not been released”, except one source describes him as “an asian”.
That usually means his name or ethnicity Can Not Be Named — “Mohammed something” perhaps?
April 16, 2007 at 3:25 PM
Unfortunately, one can not legislate evil out of existence. But the usual suspects will demand increased gun control. Sadly not one of them will mention the need for increased self control, or the golden rule.
I’m sure the shooter will be diagnosed with low self esteem, as well as a whole boat load of various illnesses. The schools will be required to address these new problems.
April 16, 2007 at 4:10 PM
As terrible as this is, and it is, more than this many people die in Iraq every day. You wonder why Iraq citizens think it is ok to kill Americans? We are numb to this. And I think that a nation at war is more violent as a rule. Just a hunch.
April 16, 2007 at 4:18 PM
Gary, your concern is touching.
More drunk teenagers die on the roads every year than have soldiers in Iraq.
Just a thought.
April 16, 2007 at 4:24 PM
Sigmund, et al:
Exactly right. To Gary: think a little, or maybe even a lot, more. SC&A answer to Gary: perfect.
April 16, 2007 at 4:33 PM
More people die of old age than any other reason. In the end all die, so then to some it is ok to lie, cheat, hate, war, and be greedy. After all you die anyway they reason. That is not only the Bush administration, but they are a part of it. I guarantee you that when this world ends, as Warren Buffet says, you will only find out who is naked when the tide goes out. And Bush will be one of those who are naked.
April 16, 2007 at 4:43 PM
A quote below shows that maybe the peace dividends of the cold war have been squandered, and maybe because of people like Rove we are a meaner country politically. American has been turned into an imperialist country that is to be in a constant state of war. That is what these folks want. See below:
Perhaps the most tragic development in U.S. foreign policy during the Bush presidency has been the reinstitution of a Manichean, Cold-War-like worldview, which has been promoted ably by social conservatives of the Religious Right and the neoconservatives in and outside the administration. Instead of working to reap the long-lost peace dividends that were supposed to emerge after the end of the bipolar confrontation, institutes like the EPPC, the Committee on the Present Danger, and the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, along with their influential spokespersons, are intent on propagating an imperial foreign policy that envisions the United States forever at war. http://rightweb.irc-online.org/rw/4024
April 16, 2007 at 4:50 PM
Leave it to some liberal kook to some how blaime this horrible event on the Iraq war. As if the country being at war has a violent effect on the general population? Might as well blaimed it on violence in Hollywood movies that would actually be a more plausable theory there kooky! But alas it was most certainly just some deranged person looking for his 15 minutes worth of fame on the 24 hour news cycle. Perhaps he was a Muslim (read religously insane) the media will try to bury that fact like they tried to do with the Mall shooter incident in Salt Lake City. Will we soon learn the truth?
April 16, 2007 at 5:13 PM
Hey Gary maybe it was Dick Cheney he’s a pretty good shot you left wing loon. Next there be the typical liberal call to collect all of our guns from guys like Gary, as if we don’t need them for our protection in this crazy world. There is only one person alone responsible for this tragedy and that is the shooter. Direct your rage at the criminal sir otherwise you are sadly misguided.
April 17, 2007 at 1:24 AM
Scar, I don’t have any problem blaming the shooter. The guy who shot up U of Texas had a brain tumor. Stuff happens. I am just saying that the mean spirited lying Cheney and the lying that has been done toward the American people, and 5 years of no ending war does not help.
Scar, you don’t know if there would have been more funding to help this guy if we hadn’t blown a trillion dollars in Iraq. You just don’t know. We are hurting our country by neglect. Lying to the American people about why we went into Iraq is not left or right wing. I came to this through talking with a government official. I am outraged, and others must know to decide for themselves. Tell you what. If terrorists make it into this country through our ships I will certainly blame Bush for any killing that occurs.
April 17, 2007 at 1:26 AM
BTW if it was you or I on the hunting trip, we would have been investigated for drinking like Cheney was NOT investigated. He was drinking and the hostess of the event lied when she said he wasn’t.
April 17, 2007 at 2:17 AM
I really don’t understand what the post is trying to say. If you say that, “when violence or threats of violence are considered legitimate forms of political or social expression, inevitably violence or threats of violence will manifest themselves,” aren’t you forgetting that threatening to go to war against Iraq was itself a threat of violence, and that the Bush administration considered it a legitimate form of political expression?
April 17, 2007 at 2:30 AM
personally, i see (speculate) that there are more people running amok (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Runs_amok) in society today. blame always goes to liberal society or a loosening of moral values. lashing out is a way one can regain prestige or go out in a blaze of glory. it is not an south east asian phenomena (ie: go postal, suicide by cop). all the news feeds are dumping out all sorts of conjecture and the pundits are all speculating on the societal ills that are fomenting these violent and tragic outbursts. i blame cultural indifference.
April 17, 2007 at 3:12 AM
[...] Other blogs about this: (Please note, I DO NOT AGREE with some of these) Virginia Tech: Shootings 20 dead/20 injured at Virginia Tech right now… Breaking News: Shootings at Virginia Tech *updated at least 22 killed* 21 DEAD IN VIRGINIA TECH SHOOTING 22 dead in Va. Tech shooting rampage, Gunman shot people in a dorm, second building; suspect among dead Over 20 people killed on Virginia Tech Campus Virginia Tech shooting leaves me to believe the world is full of cowards. Oh my God. Virginia Tech Shootings 33 dead after school shooting Highly unlikely this was a spur of the moment emotional move (VT shooting) Why There Are Piles Of Dead Bodies At Virginia Tech [...]
April 17, 2007 at 7:40 AM
Exactly.
lauriekendrick.wordpress.com
April 17, 2007 at 8:56 AM
[...] also Why There Are Piles Of Dead Bodies At Virginia Tech. Posted by SC&A Filed in [...]
April 17, 2007 at 9:15 AM
I’m Germany and I’m sure NOT every Swiss household owns a gun, first of all. As a matter of fact, in most Swiss villages, there’s no need for one nor do people lock their doors at night.
As a European residing in the US and having traveled all over the US, I have noticed a very cocky attitude amongst Americans which you seem to touch on in so many words. We’re number one, our values, our truth, is universal. Land of the free? Hardly. Freedoms are given / applied to the wrong causes / people. How is it that teens can drive a car at age 16, also a deadly weapon when driven by a hormone-laden youth, underestimating the power, speed of a car and most of all, underestimating his own control over it.
How can it be permitted that outdated laws that were made in an era when guns were less powerful and accurate than today – are still applied and held up, waved into people’s faces until this very day? Progress, people. You’re constitution is outdated.
If us Germans had not made changes and would cling to old laws, where would this world be today??
One summer, all I wanted was to enjoy the weather on my deck behind my fenced-in property. I live on a wooded hill and right before I felt an impact on my arm, I saw a child looking up to where I was, watching me – with something – a pellet gun – perhaps in his hands. Since we live in a rural community I guess I have to simply EXPECT that many of my neighbors own guns, both pellet guns and real guns. For an amateur as myself it is impossible to distinguish the difference, the experience is the same…fear! So here I was, target of some neighborhood kid which some people may find amusing.
Well, why this boy was outside, unsupervised and using neighbors for target practice is a mystery because I’m a parent myself and would not want to instill this value into my children…that the careless handling of any weapon at the risk of hurting others is okay.
So I called the police, gave a statement and a parent aswered the door, supposedly not owning a beebee gun, unaware what had happened but teaching his kid also another big no-no. That it’s okay to lie to law enforcement. This would have been a good opportunity to teach a lesson, instead, the officer came back, telling me that these are simple but good people, that they deny it but that the son probably did it. Then I was questioned, the officer noticed my German accent and and said since you’re from Germany you’re probably not used to this but it’s normal here for kids run around the woods and shoot their bee-bee guns.
Well, I saw that little sucker, I saw him watch me before he shot, then he hid again… he shot from his own property and targeted a human, me.
Since this seems to be okay in this county, we now own a bee-bee gun too and I wait every day to see this kid running through my woods so that I can shoot him. *g*
Well, not exactly,but this is indeed a thought that occurred to me and my husband… yet – we know better than that.
When parents allow for this kind of behavior to go unpunished, who will these kids become when they grow up?
April 17, 2007 at 9:32 AM
Don’t look now, but it’s the conservatives who propose to disarm the liberals.
And — did I miss something? — it looks to me as if Gary agreed with the post. When people are really cranky, they disagree even with those who agree with them.
April 17, 2007 at 10:54 AM
Daniela of Germany, excellent reply. People write things like “all Swiss have guns” with no evidence. It’s how a lot of ignorance gets spread in the US, and before long the neocons think they have the right to stick their nose in and tell everyone else how to run their countries.
And stating that more teens die in cars than soldiers are killed in Iraq is an absurdly false corollary.
People don’t get in cars intending to maim.
A sportswriter defending boxing once wrote that more people die on bicycles than die boxing.
As if the goal of getting on a bike was to alter someone else’s EEG. There’s no legitimate grounds for comparison.
The stupidity of such a false corollary ought to be obvious to anyone giving it a shred of analytic thought.
Unfortunately, those who can’t tell the difference between reactionary fundamentalists in Afghanistan and a socialist dictator in Iraq are running and ruining America now, unless enough people can see through this crap and turn us back into the kind of respectful neighbor America once was.
April 17, 2007 at 10:56 AM
Ya lead in with dead bodies and leave off with guns, politics and whatelse? Am I missing something?
April 17, 2007 at 11:05 AM
There are over 6 billion people interacting on our planet now. When one of them snaps and does something like this virtually anywhere in the world, we now hear about it. It’s not global warming or the war in Iraq or anything else other than one person’s mind going terribly wrong.
April 17, 2007 at 11:19 AM
SC&A says: “Switzerland and Israel are both countries with guns in every home, …”
Maybe in Israel it is because there is more control because they have not completely divorced the spiritual from the physical in life, because the sanctity of life is instilled through tradition which they practice daily, not denatured by PC multicultural politics into mindbending frustration?
GA,
“If terrorists make it into this country through our ships I will certainly blame Bush for any killing that occurs.”
They are already in the country. WTC 1993 mean nothing to you?
As for these shooting incidents at schools and colleges, (don’t forget what happened in South Korea a few years ago), why not blame the generation who smoked, injected and sniffed certain substances and very possibly messed up their ability to think clearly while conceiving offspring with a propensity for mindboggling behaviour?
April 17, 2007 at 11:34 AM
The gun or guns didn’t just wake up yesterday morning and decide to run out and kill somebody. It was a PERSON who did that. A person who was not motivated by anything other that insanity! Don’t blame George W. Bush (And some have – how ridiculous is that?) and don’t blame Americans who exercise their CONSTITUTIONAL right to own firearms. Blame the psychotic dullard who committed these heinous acts, while mourning the senseless loss of life of the innocent and pray that the endless repetition of “record-breaking death toll” doesn’t inspire a lot of copycat lunatics!
God rest their souls and God bless that holocaust survivor who saved lives at the cost of his own.
April 17, 2007 at 11:41 AM
Actually, Switzerland does have one of the highest ratios of gun ownership.
See these:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics_in_Switzerland
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/1566715.stm
http://www.stephenhalbrook.com/articles/guns-crime-swiss.html
It is astonishing to me top see how many idiots will shoot their mouths off, out of the desire to be heard and taken seriously, notwithstanding their stupidity.
Did you get that, Ombudsben?
April 17, 2007 at 1:03 PM
Actually, I know someone in Switzerland. I’ve been there, and stayed with them. I know they don’t own a gun, so you’re still all wet.
Now, why don’t you address the comparison of teen auto deaths to Iraqi soldiers? It’s still ludicruous.
Not quite as ludicruous as attacking an Arab socialist in Iraq to fight fundamentalists in Afghanistan, but nearly as stupid.
April 17, 2007 at 1:15 PM
There is no right or wrong. There is only agreement or disagreement by those with the power to implement it. What happens in message boards and/or commentary, for the most part is the verbal contract of communication. A hopefully informed & civil exchange, equal or not, of ideas.
The use of weapons as a solution is a unilateral form of communication by those, who, for whatever their tragic reason, forego the exchange. It’s shape is narrowcast, pointed & very often takes the grammatical form of a death sentence.
April 17, 2007 at 1:17 PM
“I know someone in Switzerland. I’ve been there, and stayed with them. I know they don’t own a gun, so you’re still all wet.”
Right. Anecdotal evidence. Given the nature of this exchange, your friends might have owned a gun (more than likely, from a statistical standpoint) and have had the good sense not to tell you about it.
You aren’t just an idiot, you are a MAGNIFICENT example of the species.
Now, I’ll slow down and make it easy for you.
Why not address the reality of Swiss gun ownership and crimes I allude to?
April 17, 2007 at 1:27 PM
Let’s see if we can connect the knuckle-dragger dots:
Over 200 years ago we had citizen militias with muskets defending us from an absolute monarch. Absent a police force and with a nascent military in an era before automatic weapons, we needed a citizen militia.
Our founding fathers thus wrote about the need for A WELL-REGULATED militia needing guns. Obviously, they knew guns needed to be regulated. (They also counted African-Americans as 3/5ths of a person for the census, do any of you think we should preserve that bit of constitutional dogma?)
My great-grandpa had gun and he hunted game.
Switzerland hasn’t fought a war for centuries. They have an active citizen militia, and those households with men serving in their militias keep rifles.
This is comparable to suburban and urban America.
Therefore, automatic and semiautomatic weapons should be available for street warfare in America, our emergency room doctors need to be trained in saving gunshot victims with multiple gunshot wounds, and hours and hours of their time that could be spent helping heal others needs to be jeopardized saving drug criminals lives.
Because Switzerland has a militia. And great-grandpa used to hunt deer. Preserve the right to keep up the urban slaughter.
That about covers it, yeah?
p.s. One more thing: honor the second amendment: Regulate guns.
April 17, 2007 at 1:33 PM
Erm….did alienation and depression cross anyone else’s mind???
The gunman has been identified as a South Korean Virginia Tech senior Cho Seung-Hui who has lived in the US for 12 years. As an Asian, i can imagine the racial prejudices & alienation he must have faced (think ‘Lost in Translation’ over a 12-year stretch), what with limited opportunities for people of colour (black or yellow and being despised and treated like an outsider in their own home. These social problems run far deeper and are harder to rectify that a guns law.
It has been reported that Cho had sought treatment for depression and I am sure it is hard to deal with it without the support of friends and family. I am sure this killing is a result of a long period of emotional turbulence (nobody kills people for fun). The ease of purchasing arms did not set off this incident but rather catalysed it.
That being said, I am awfully sorry for the victims of the killings.
April 17, 2007 at 1:45 PM
Amen. I’m sorry for the victims, and their families, too.
Apparently, the Times of London’s headline today said something to the effect only the date and the number of killed changes.
The Europeans and the world get it. The carnage in America continues.
Some day this too will become a civilized nation, and we can stop burying our children.
April 17, 2007 at 1:45 PM
Brilliant.
You have made an excellent case against gun control laws. It’s not the guns that kill, it’s people who kill.
Has it ever occurred to you that maybe there aren’t mass killings in Switzerland because of the easy availability and accessibility of guns? Study after study have shown that the availability of guns has a direct correlation on the level of crime?
By the way, allow me to congratulate you on no longer spewing the ‘no evidence of lots of guns in Switzerland’ drivel you espoused in your first comment. If you ask nicely, I might remove that pesky reminder of your lack of knowledge or deceit- which in either case, hardly qualifies you as credible.
While I understand your need to draw attention away from reality, the majority of your last comment is neither germane or relevant to the discussion at hand. To pretend they are is to highlight intellectual deficiency- yours. Let’s stick to the topic at hand, shall we?
As noted, a MAGNIFICENT example.
Good fodder for a later post, don’t you think?
April 17, 2007 at 1:45 PM
Ed I don’t agree with SCA. I don’t believe that violence is acceptable. I just believe that we are numb to it in Iraq. If NYC had 100 people per day killed (and it is larger than Bagdad, people would think society is falling apart and would be up in arms. But they think nothing about what is happening in Iraq so that we can steal oil.
April 17, 2007 at 1:45 PM
SC&A,
You opened yourself up to anecdotal evidence when you started speaking in absolutes. Clearly, not every household in Switzerland owns a gun. Have you gone house to house taking a census?
April 17, 2007 at 1:48 PM
For that, I stand corrected, Mrs Flipphead. I should have said ‘virtually every household.’
April 17, 2007 at 1:51 PM
Well written article and truly addresses what I believe is the heart of this kind of violence in the US.
April 17, 2007 at 1:52 PM
Yes, Europe, that continent that gave us the Holocaust and religious persecution for centuries, and that continent from which the forefathers of our nation came to escape persecution.
Yes, Europe, where violence and antisemitism run rampant again, is the example we need to follow. The Europeans are icons of virtue we need to emulate.
You really are an idiot.
April 17, 2007 at 2:03 PM
>> Switzerland and Israel are both countries with guns in every home … Nevertheless, the kind of gun violence we have just witnessed at Virgian Tech, at Columbine or other places, are unheard of in those places.
On simple population stats alone, gun attacks are 48 times more likely in the USA than in Israel, and 40 times more likely in the USA than Switzerland.
The CIA give the following population figures:
USA: 298 million
Israel: 6.2 million
Switzerland: 7.5 million
Your comment about the absence of gun-massacres in Israel and Switzerland proves no point at all. There’d have to be 40 or 48 Columbines and Virginia Techs for just one to be as likely in Switzerland or in Israel.
You can argue in any direction you like, but if you want any credibility please make sure that your logic holds good.
Aphra.
April 17, 2007 at 2:10 PM
I submit that over the decades, there have been more than enough incidents here in the US to prove my point.
It is the culture, and not the guns that are the problem- and that is my point.
“You can argue in any direction you like, but if you want any credibility please make sure that your logic holds good.”
April 17, 2007 at 2:15 PM
>> I submit that over the decades, there have been more than enough incidents here in the US to prove my point.
Compared with how many in Israel and Switzerland over the same number of decades?
If you move the goalposts on one side of the equation you should move them on the other. Or didn’t your Math(s) teacher teach you that?
If you use Israel and Switzerland to prove your point, then your point falls down.
Sorry.
Aphra.
April 17, 2007 at 2:26 PM
“Compared with how many in Israel and Switzerland over the same number of decades?”
Virtually none. The kind of crime we see here is unparalleled anywhere.
Further, In the case of Israel, when you factor in social, environmental and cultural stresses on that nation, the crime differential becomes even more remarkable.
Israel has seen sudden and huge influxes of Russian Jews, Ethiopian Jews and Jews from other countries that have placed huge demands on social service and political infrastructures.
The Israelis are also under stress from ‘peace loving’ neighbors that for almost six decades have posed an existential threat- in a very literal sense.
I could go on, but I’m sure you get the point.
What we are witnessing now is the result of a culture that has come to legitimize terror and violence as an acceptable form of expression.
Now, the time has come for the piper to be paid.
April 17, 2007 at 2:27 PM
There was something that came to mind, with all the sites mentioning Charles Whitman. I pulled up this reference from Wikipedia:
“Once Whitman began facing return gunfire from the authorities, he used the waterspouts on each side of the tower as turrets, which allowed him to continue shooting while largely protected from the gunfire below, which had grown to include civilians who had brought out their personal firearms to assist police.”
Those folks helped keep him distracted while the police managed to get inside the tower and eventually bring him down.
I’m waiting to hear whether the killer at Virginia Tech was a fan of rap music. We have so many types of media in this country that glorify random violence. Is it so surprising that people act out on what they see and hear?
April 17, 2007 at 2:34 PM
>> >> “Compared with how many in Israel and Switzerland over the same number of decades?”
>> Virtually none
Which still doesn’t prove your point, because it does not address the issue about the relative sizes of the countries.
The reason that there are far fewer gun crimes outside the US is that the US is far bigger than most countries.
Incidentally, don’t forget the massacres in the UK:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungerford_Massacre
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunblane_Massacre
You still need to sharpen up your arguments to put a convincing case.
Aphra.
April 17, 2007 at 2:37 PM
Hungerford and Dunblane are in Switzerland or Israel?
April 17, 2007 at 2:58 PM
Daniela,
I am so sick of the “we learned the lessons of WWII” line. I’ve experienced enough “adult” male drivers in Germany who act like idiots on the highway. I won’t defend what your neighbor’s kid did, but did you ever talk to him? If you did, did you tell him how superior Germany is to the red neck community where you reside? Perhaps I could send him transcripts from neighborhood Kneipe in Germany where the men sit around discussing Kant and Hegel.
I would like to point out that there are people who do hunt responsibly in the US. They teach their kids how to hunt responsibly. They want their kids to know where their food comes from. Also many people who live in the country do need weapons because of wild animals. An acquaintence once had a bear try to break through his living room window. One wild bear (the only one, and he was an Auslander) in Bavaria was a hot news item for a week in Bavaria. After suitable consultations with ethics committees he was dispatched–with a gun.
ob,
Do we know that he suffered discrimination? Perhaps Atta suffered discrimination in Hamburg and, lacking access to a gun, decided to express his rage with an airplane aimed at the world’s second-favorite scapegoat. Every immigrant group that has ever come to America has experienced the tension between the traditions of the old and new homelands. It is not easy.
April 17, 2007 at 3:35 PM
SC&A, I’d never dream of asking you to pull your comment — it reflects on you and the convolutions of your argument.
The lack of lucidity you display has no bearing on me.
If I were to post as you do, I might write things such as:
“People in Darfur have no gun control and they are killing each other, therefore rural Virginia is like Darfur because guns are unregulated, ubiquious, and people are being killed.”
That’s the mirror of your Swiss militia point.
The tortuous arguments the gun community makes speak for their own lack of lucidity. The Swiss nation has existed for centuries without murdering each other like inner city DC, and you strain to find a parallel between the US and them.
Then, after bringing up Switzerland, you comment in a strained attempt at irony:
“Europe, where violence and antisemitism run rampant again, is the example we need to follow. The Europeans are icons of virtue we need to emulate.”
Violence is running rampant in Europe, is it? What, are you making some reference to the bombings in Madrid and London?
The Europeans fought the Stern Gang, the Red Brigade and other terrorist organizations in the 70s and 80s. And they evntually defeated them. Without the hysterical approach of the neocons, attacking other nations as we attacked Iraq.
And others are to be criticized for bringing up Europe, but you can cite the Swiss?
If it werent so tragic, it woujld be amusing to see the hoops the gun community will jump through to justify allowing automatic weaponry on the streets. Yeah, like people are going to hunt Bambi with assault rifles.
Your site is well-named, as few rationalizations for owning automatic weaponry would be too byzantine to be justified here.
April 17, 2007 at 3:39 PM
>> Hungerford and Dunblane are in Switzerland or Israel?
Follow the Wikipedia links. Hungerford is in England.
Dunblane is in Scotland.
I linked to those two massacres because they show that the US is not the only place where gunmen go mad and massacre people.
(The population of the UK is, incidentally, 60.6 million, making it 1/5th of the size of the US, and therefore making massacres there 1/5th as likely -discounting cultural differences and differences in the availability of guns. Incidentally, both massacres were followed by significant changes in the gun legislation. Illegal guns are however widely available in the UK. You can make of that what you will – it is too complex a situation for me to draw conclusions from).
To be honest, I don’t have an opinion one way or the other on whether there are massacres in the US because of the availability of guns, because of your cultural heritage or because the moon is made of green cheese.
I DO dislike arguments based on statistics (“there aren’t any massacres in Switzerland and Isreal, therefore… yadda de yadda”) which ignore basic statistical data. They don’t prove any points. They weaken the rest of the case being made.
You can choose to ignore what I am saying and continue with a weak argument, or accept what I am saying and improve the quality of your argument.
I don’t care either way.
Just, please, don’t abuse simple statistical data.
Aphra.
April 17, 2007 at 3:51 PM
“The Europeans fought the Stern Gang.”
As I have pointed out, you are either ignorant of the facts or being deliberately deceitful.
In either case, you are in no position to opine.
As noted, there will be a post on our exchange.
April 17, 2007 at 5:29 PM
I grew up with my dad taking me hunting. I have no problem with gun freedom. After all somebody needs to stand up to the government if it becomes oppressive. That is what the constitution is founded upon.
But when you, SCA say that the problem is culture, and then call someone an “idiot” you put your finger on it. You are the problem. And it isn’t just left or right wing kooks, it is everyone in a society where ceo’s make out like bandits, where business greed is beyond anything I have ever seen, where we have a president who lies about Iraq oil every single day, where a professor warns VT and they were maybe too busy or underfunded to even bother counselling this kid.
Yes, SCA, stay mean spirited as you are and you will contribute to this decay of culture. You put your finger right on it.
April 18, 2007 at 6:03 AM
[...] title, ” Why are there piles of bodies at Virginia Tech ” talks about the epidemic of violence in our schools and broaches the subject of guns and [...]
April 18, 2007 at 7:13 AM
I believe that the Swiss have guns because the are in the military or in the reserves. One would have to ask whether immigrants would have access to them.
If our gun laws are a factor in this event, shouldn’t one also ask whether civil rights for the mentally ill might not be a factor. It seems there were numerous warnings about this man and referrals to authorities, but no one felt they could do anything.
Finally, CNN World is talking rather extensively about fear of backlash against Koreans in America. As if we can’t distinguish between an isolated psychopath and all the normal Koreans in America.
April 18, 2007 at 9:47 AM
I want to expand a little on the Swiss situation. The people who have the guns were trained by their military. They are integrated into a total picture of Swissness. This probably helps people resist the trashy cultural influences of movies and video games.
A consensus on what being American means is being eroded. Blue staters look down on ignorant, gun-toting redneck red staters, and red staters don’t like being told what to do by metrosexual blue state wimps who can’t skin a rabbit. Minority victim groups cannot even fit into the larger blue state or red state groups. They are forced to integrate their own backgrounds into a society whose norms are blurry to say the least. All (be it radical PETA types, gun nuts, gansta rappers or Hispanic gangsters) who have no sense of belonging to a larger culture with clear standards are susceptible to the cultural sleaze they experience.
I think many Americans underestimate how homogenous European culture has been at the level of the average person. This is changing rapidly because of immigration and the decline of moral instances such as the churches. Local customs and class standards have served a function similar to our American dream ideal. We are all in the same boat but we have used different ramps to get there.
April 18, 2007 at 9:51 AM
Expat, both your comments are on the money.
Really insightful.
April 18, 2007 at 9:52 PM
Maybe we should look at the numbers (I know, what a novel concept). Before legalizing possession of guns and liberalizing laws regarding concealed carry permits, Florida had a gun-related crime rate almost 40% higher than the national average. After the changes the gun-related crime rate dropped to below the national average. This is from the FBI. Seems that being able to own a gun and being able to defend yourself and your family made a lot of those gun-using criminals reconsider the odds. The states with the most liberal gun owning laws have the lowest rates of gun-related crimes. It’s only the states and cities (see New York and DC) that forbid legal gun ownership where you see the criminals (as in “when guns are criminalized only criminals will have guns). Those who would ban ownership of guns tell us to depend on law enforcement to protect us. Virginia Tech is a “gun free zone.” Law enforcement really protected those professors and students, right? A law allowing people with concealed carry permits to carry their weapons on college campuses was recently killed in the Virginia legislature. Could someone with a legal gun have prevented or at least reduced the slaughter? We don’t know. We do know they weren’t permitted to try.
April 22, 2007 at 1:32 PM
Walter, have you ever seen the way too many college kids drink? Are you aware of the assault statistics among college kids?
Would you want to stand up in front of a class with several kids packing heat?
What in the world would make anyone think that a step toward escalating the violence would be a solution?
July 1, 2007 at 7:41 AM
[...] speaking of the horrific violence at Virginia Tech, we noted that When violence or threats of violence are considered legitimate forms of political or [...]
February 15, 2008 at 9:32 AM
[...] wrote in Why There Are Piles Of Dead Bodies At Virginia Tech that When violence or threats of violence are considered legitimate forms of political or [...]
April 7, 2008 at 8:46 AM
[...] wrote in Why There Are Piles Of Dead Bodies At Vrigina Tech: When violence or threats of violence are considered legitimate forms of political or social [...]
April 16, 2008 at 9:25 AM
[...] we will republish some our posts on the anniversary of the Virginia Tech massacre. First up is Why There Are Piles Of Dead Bodies At Virginia Tech How is possible that at least one gunman shot and killed at least 22 people and wounded [...]