Outside Opinion On America's Shooting?
- Thread starter Poindexter
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To be honest, the prevailing opinion of Americans in the Europe is exactly that, except we think you're all crazy as well.Poindexter said:
When these mass shootings take place every six months or so the, the reaction isn't so much one of horror but of eye rolling and feigned surprise. Even the BBC is all 'gun massacre in America, fancy that, in other news' and they're not usually ones to make light of tragedy.
Japan/ Australia here.
I didnt really see in the Japanese news.
The election is going on right now, so the whole kate prank call suicide and gun shooting never really made it as big news.
I find it difficult to relate to the gun shooting because guns are very controlled in Japan.
I think there is too much business and politics involved in the U.S. to take away the guns.
I didnt really see in the Japanese news.
The election is going on right now, so the whole kate prank call suicide and gun shooting never really made it as big news.
I find it difficult to relate to the gun shooting because guns are very controlled in Japan.
I think there is too much business and politics involved in the U.S. to take away the guns.
Danish guy here who works as a school (substitute teacher) and i also study security for a hobby.
As usual we got the media drooling all over, covering everything from hero teachers to police response to the personal life of the perpetrator and his family and shocked responses from affected people.
Some observations though:
1) Gun laws aren't going to help.
The gun problem in America is rooted in culture, and the fact that Mexico is a close neighbor. A potential gun law is going to be in the same boat as anti-piracy laws in that they won't work because most people who owns a gun aren't going to give a sh*t (just like most internet pirates don't give a sh*t). You can't fix this problem with law. You need to make a cultural change, which can take many decades and might be impossible. And you will still need to deal with smuggling and black market trade.
And even then, this isn't going to help against this particular problem. Simple fact: If a maniac wants weapons in America to conduct a school/movie theater/pet kitten schooting, he is going to be able to get his hands on them. Period. It doesn't matter how many gun laws you pass.
2) You can't protect yourself against this kind of attack
It's a fact. You simply can't. You can't put armed guards and metal detectors at every school/university/college in the country. It isn't going to happen. It's financially and logistically impossible to protect everything and cover every angle. And even if you could, sooner or later you would start seeing tragedies where the armed guards shot someone instead.
In addition it's also impossible to train people for this kind of stuff. Teachers are NOT soldiers. They cannot be expected to act rationally or "according to plan" once something like this happens, even if you try to train them for it.
What you CAN do, however, is provide them knowledge. They need to know the emergency exits in the school. They need to know emergency tools they can use (fire axes, hiding places, school communication/speaker system), which Windows you can make the children crawl out of etc.
3) People focus too much on prevention, too little on response.
As i mentioned, preventing this kind of attack is impossible, yet people have a complete tendency to focus on how you can prevent this kind of attack, and often this comes at the cost of how you can RESPOND to this kind of attack.
Response is important, and failure to respond properly can have fatal consequences. The problems that Oslo police encountered during the Breivik massacre last year because their response plan and preperation was poor came at the cost of everywhere between 10 and 25 lives on Utøya. Once a situation like this arises, police getting to the scene quickly and getting an overview of the situation is going to save lives.
It's my understanding that police in this case responded very rapidly. If they hadn't, this shooting might easily have had twice the body-count. Good work on their part, but unfortunately good response still doesn't prevent the first brunt of an attack.
As usual we got the media drooling all over, covering everything from hero teachers to police response to the personal life of the perpetrator and his family and shocked responses from affected people.
Some observations though:
1) Gun laws aren't going to help.
The gun problem in America is rooted in culture, and the fact that Mexico is a close neighbor. A potential gun law is going to be in the same boat as anti-piracy laws in that they won't work because most people who owns a gun aren't going to give a sh*t (just like most internet pirates don't give a sh*t). You can't fix this problem with law. You need to make a cultural change, which can take many decades and might be impossible. And you will still need to deal with smuggling and black market trade.
And even then, this isn't going to help against this particular problem. Simple fact: If a maniac wants weapons in America to conduct a school/movie theater/pet kitten schooting, he is going to be able to get his hands on them. Period. It doesn't matter how many gun laws you pass.
2) You can't protect yourself against this kind of attack
It's a fact. You simply can't. You can't put armed guards and metal detectors at every school/university/college in the country. It isn't going to happen. It's financially and logistically impossible to protect everything and cover every angle. And even if you could, sooner or later you would start seeing tragedies where the armed guards shot someone instead.
In addition it's also impossible to train people for this kind of stuff. Teachers are NOT soldiers. They cannot be expected to act rationally or "according to plan" once something like this happens, even if you try to train them for it.
What you CAN do, however, is provide them knowledge. They need to know the emergency exits in the school. They need to know emergency tools they can use (fire axes, hiding places, school communication/speaker system), which Windows you can make the children crawl out of etc.
3) People focus too much on prevention, too little on response.
As i mentioned, preventing this kind of attack is impossible, yet people have a complete tendency to focus on how you can prevent this kind of attack, and often this comes at the cost of how you can RESPOND to this kind of attack.
Response is important, and failure to respond properly can have fatal consequences. The problems that Oslo police encountered during the Breivik massacre last year because their response plan and preperation was poor came at the cost of everywhere between 10 and 25 lives on Utøya. Once a situation like this arises, police getting to the scene quickly and getting an overview of the situation is going to save lives.
It's my understanding that police in this case responded very rapidly. If they hadn't, this shooting might easily have had twice the body-count. Good work on their part, but unfortunately good response still doesn't prevent the first brunt of an attack.
I didn't hear much, I'm in a bit of a news blackout but my thoughts were a guess a little worrying. It just didn't seem that special to me and I was surprised so many people were being changed by this. This just happens very regularly in the US. Your shooting in 2005 was worse. You've had a school shooting with a double digit count roughly every decade since the 1970's. In the years of 1986-1990 71 people were shot in schools, 200 severely wounded and 240 held hostage at gunpoint.
1992-2000 over 20 people were shot in a school every single year and the number was closer to 70 for most years.
Columbine, Virginia tech. This isn't new, this is the reality of the world that we've been living in for the last 40 years. Every year people get shot in a US school including seven this year before now and every 5-10 years there will be a double digit shooting. My faith in humanity is exactly what it was 10 years ago learning about Columbine. Low.
It'd be nice if you didn't have guns but it's clearly too late to stop now. I agree with the guy Charlie Brooker quoted, that if the news could tone it down, not get excited and not cover it to any great extent then the number of shootings would probably reduce. I can't imagine it would help. This is tragic, but it's exactly as tragic as the fact that we live in the world where this has got something like a 1 in 10 of happening in any given year
1992-2000 over 20 people were shot in a school every single year and the number was closer to 70 for most years.
Columbine, Virginia tech. This isn't new, this is the reality of the world that we've been living in for the last 40 years. Every year people get shot in a US school including seven this year before now and every 5-10 years there will be a double digit shooting. My faith in humanity is exactly what it was 10 years ago learning about Columbine. Low.
It'd be nice if you didn't have guns but it's clearly too late to stop now. I agree with the guy Charlie Brooker quoted, that if the news could tone it down, not get excited and not cover it to any great extent then the number of shootings would probably reduce. I can't imagine it would help. This is tragic, but it's exactly as tragic as the fact that we live in the world where this has got something like a 1 in 10 of happening in any given year
Yeah but the change is always in the direction of increased security. Not surprisingly, because stuff like this makes people scared. But with enough events like these (and there's been pretty damn many) you would think the fear should wake people up and make them say hey, people like this guy are part of our society and if they're ostracised as losers or psychos if they don't have a job, friends or a facebook account, stuff like this is bound to happen. I know that's against the American Way, standing on your own two feet and being independent and all that, but you do live in a community - one that looks like a community and says it's a community, but doesn't act like a community.the darknees abyss said:
Asking for and "Outside opinion" sounds kinda smug to me. Like there was something very special about this kind of stuff happening in America particularly.
Anyway, I'm from Finland, and here it's just another tragedy, just a bigger one for a change. Of course it's horrible, but doesn't really move me one way or another. I read most of it on the internet anyway, so the media coverage hardly mattered to me.
Anyway, I'm from Finland, and here it's just another tragedy, just a bigger one for a change. Of course it's horrible, but doesn't really move me one way or another. I read most of it on the internet anyway, so the media coverage hardly mattered to me.
I'm not America but you think they try and stop psychos like this and protect the children.Blood Brain Barrier said:
If you protect the "psychos" too (and not by putting walls around them), then you won't need to protect the children (by putting walls around them).the darknees abyss said:
Athinira said:
Quoted for truth, bro.
England here - This story reached my ears as "Another school shooting in America." See that first word? Nobody here was surprised. No shock, no "Oh my god how can this happen?". We knew exactly how it could happen, and as Athinira said, there's not a lot we can do any more. America's got it into its peoples' heads that guns represent freedom, and now we can't take them away. If I had the power and the resources, I would have every firearm traced, confiscated and destroyed. Failure to produce a registered firearm on demand should be met with legal prosecution. This at least would take MOST of the guns out of the equation, and that way every report of a gun can be responded to with adequate force, since the owner won't have a permit because they don't exist anymore. Yes, a black market will still exist. Yes, criminals and gangsters will still shoot each other in fairly isolated incidents.
No, an angry teenager won't have access to these black markets. So yeah, the amount of mass-shootings WILL go down, and soon the only tragedies you'd hear would be gang members found dead or heists gone wrong - and the latter is so very rare it's not really a counterpoint.
So that's at least my personal reaction. Less on the tragedy itself, and more on the fact that America STILL LETS THIS HAPPEN.
That what i'm saying but if everyone can have a gun how do you know who the psychos are.Blood Brain Barrier said:
Finland reporting in.
What I've heard is pretty much 14 dead (last I cehcked) and total of 28 victims?
And the culprit was found dead, that's about it.
Haven't checked media too much... too depressing....
My thoughts?
Not again, please... about my only thoughts really, In school shootings I guess the most I've read about are US and the 2 we've had here in Finland.
Very tragic events, not much to be done, it's a shame.
What I've heard is pretty much 14 dead (last I cehcked) and total of 28 victims?
And the culprit was found dead, that's about it.
Haven't checked media too much... too depressing....
My thoughts?
Not again, please... about my only thoughts really, In school shootings I guess the most I've read about are US and the 2 we've had here in Finland.
Very tragic events, not much to be done, it's a shame.
I do think it's a sizeable amount of Great Britain - and probably Ireland. Okay, certainly Ireland. With Irish recent history I'm fairly sure the people there might have a bit more awareness about what happens when you arm violent people.anthony87 said:
You really believe this guy was a "psycho"? Socially awkward, no friends, bullied in school, divorced parents. Society places these people on the bottom of the pile, as losers, even though he was academically talented. I'm not saying all that caused the violence, but the question is would it have happened if he was valued in some way by society instead of rejected by it. Nothing happens in isolation.the darknees abyss said:
UK, it was a tragic incident which is the general theme i picked up on from the media. i saw a BBC interview talking to one of the police officers in charge, and she seemed like a *****. didn't seem to care in the slightest, just wanted as much juice on the story as possible, which annoyed me seeing as how damn recent it was, and the fact that that officer had been inside first hand and had to see the aftermath...
personally though, i don't think it'll have an impact on gun control. in my eyes you either get rid of pretty much all of them, or the change won't be significant enough
personally though, i don't think it'll have an impact on gun control. in my eyes you either get rid of pretty much all of them, or the change won't be significant enough
England here.
I think it was a horrific tragedy and I can't even imagine how distraught the families must be now. It hasn't particularly affected my opinions on America and I don't feel that my political knowledge is strong enough for me to weigh in on the gun control argument. I just feel that this was a terrible thing to have happened.
I think it was a horrific tragedy and I can't even imagine how distraught the families must be now. It hasn't particularly affected my opinions on America and I don't feel that my political knowledge is strong enough for me to weigh in on the gun control argument. I just feel that this was a terrible thing to have happened.
Fear never wakes people up. Fear is an awful feeling to drive as motivation; if anything, it keeps them distracted from the real issues.Blood Brain Barrier said:
For example, hours after the shooting there were people claiming violent music, movies and games were responsible for it; and demand gun policy to increase because "we have to protect us from those things". That is the real effect of fear, it makes people to look for scapegoats, to act against their best interest in the name of security and to be irrational.
It's way too late to do anything about it. You just have to deal with it happening every now and then. Even if you decide to tighten your gun control it doesn't change the fact that you have guns everywhere.
Unless of course your government comes out and confiscates them from your everyday man. Which I really think they should. The fact that it's so easy to get a gun i America and that so many already have them in their homes I don't really feel sorry for you.
It's sad when it happens but it's the consequence of your culture.
As you make your bed, so you must lie in it.
For reference: I'm from Denmark, we have had one school shooting at a University in 1994 where 2 died and 2 got hurt. And that's about it.
Everyone can get a gun legally in Denmark, there are just two criteria:
1: Clean record with the Police
2: You have a hunting License
The hunting license is not 100 % necessary but you need a very very very good reason to get a gun and not having it. (Read: You are refused if you don't have a hunting license).
Unless of course your government comes out and confiscates them from your everyday man. Which I really think they should. The fact that it's so easy to get a gun i America and that so many already have them in their homes I don't really feel sorry for you.
It's sad when it happens but it's the consequence of your culture.
As you make your bed, so you must lie in it.
For reference: I'm from Denmark, we have had one school shooting at a University in 1994 where 2 died and 2 got hurt. And that's about it.
Everyone can get a gun legally in Denmark, there are just two criteria:
1: Clean record with the Police
2: You have a hunting License
The hunting license is not 100 % necessary but you need a very very very good reason to get a gun and not having it. (Read: You are refused if you don't have a hunting license).