it would probably end up in your mouth first, you disgraceful asshole

i love that though, if i enjoy the freedom, then i don't have the freedom to voice my anger, disdain and hate for my country? i guess i was right, we do love in a Stalinist dictatorship, gee thanks for proving my point GWB.

die.

you do have the freedom to go kill yourself, you do know that, right?

look go and get your gun and pull the trigger, only make sure there are no innocent bystanders when that bullet passes through the mush that is your brain.

i thought you love it or leave types died with the dinosaurs?

shoot first, ask questions later.

you're like a fucking kid, keep posting dumb shit stourley.

and if the bullet hit any "innocent bystanders", it would have to make it through you're fat skull first. which a 45 just might do.

But speaking to the broad context of the question, if everyone who was at all unhappy with the way America was going right now moved away, there would never be hope for change. Isn't it far more responsible if you think something is truly seriously wrong, to stay and try to change it from within?

Apples and oranges. CA, NY, and CT all have major urban areas with chronic poverty-stricken neighborhoods, and where the vast majority of gun crimes are gang-related. MT, WY, UT, and ID largely don't have such problems. I'll also note that most of these school rampages have happened in right-leaning suburban or semi-rural areas where guns play much more prominent roles in daily life and where access to guns is much more readily available.

While I think some common-sense gun regulations are called for on a nationwide level, I also agree that more gun laws most likely aren't going to stop a deranged sociopath from killing scores of people one way or another. The true answers to the problem (assuming there are indeed any answers) will be much more nuanced and require much more difficult conversations about our culture than merely yea/nay on gun control.

Black francis mentions that fear needs to be reduced, and I agree. Not just fear of guns, but fear in general. As Michael Moore points out, we live in a society that thrives on fear: Entire industries, media ventures, urban planning policies, and political dynasties are built around the idea of keeping the people living in fear. Fear of minorities, fear of foriegners, fear of drugs, fear of terrorists, fear of getting old, fear of disease, fear of crime, fear of cities, fear of anything that isn't lily-white-and-picket-fences a la Ozzie and Harriet. Such fears are exploited to the nth degree by everybody from the White House down to your local news anchor.

Add to that our uniquely American glorification of guns and violence, and I don't mean just in the movies. Canadians are armed to the teeth compared to the US and watch the same movies we do, but they don't live in a society that's practically been brainwashed to glorify and idolize the mythical John Wayne idea of cowboy / military man that seems so much a part of our collective culture.

I agree with rationalist, the problem is that people like SK actually want people with a different mind set to "take that big gun you have, insert in mouth and pull trigger". Brilliant!

Sorry, my response was to black frances, not rationalist or the ongoing flame war between Stourley Kracklite and eastcoastredneck03.

don't fight. you're both pretty.

he wears purple, if you call that pretty.

Your point is well taken LIG. (concerning the comparison of the states)

wow, after reading some of these posts, it seems that "america" is responsible for the shootings and not some crazy depressed kid who was really mad at his girlfriend. i think we should ban guns in america, and while we are at it, ban all knives, ropes longer than six feet, poisons, automobiles, planes, and anything else that is involved in the deaths of people. why is everyone looking to point fingers at the school or at the government for some fucked kid, if you want to blame someone, blame his parents.

This just f*cking sucks.




Ryan Clark, 22, was known as "Stack" to his friends in the Marching Virginians college band. The Virginia Tech senior came from Martinez in Georgia and was a "true example of 'The Spirit Of Tech'," according to a message posted on the band's Web site. He majored in biology and English, and carried a 4.0 grade-point average, according to the coroner in Columbia County, Georgia. Clark was a resident assistant at West Ambler Johnston Hall, the dormitory where he and another person were shot dead at 7:15 a.m. Monday. He had been planning to pursue a PhD in psychology with a focus in cognitive neuroscience, according to the Marching Virginians Web site.

let me ask you this what is worse having all of these Stalinists tell me that i can't have my freedom to tell my country to go to hell or me telling those Stalinists to blow their heads off and save a few dimes on bullets?

yeah, let's not blame our fear driven culture, perpetuated and perpetrated by this freedom loving GWB, let's blame the parents for what a 23 year old adult does.

I don't know, they are both pretty bad but way to retaliate.

it was sarcasm crazy........

Stourley- to eliminate either from blame would be unreasonable. Yes, fear driven culture is strong and problematic, but there is an insurmountable pile of evidence regarding how much individuals are shaped by their upbringing, and how that stuff can stay with a person throughout their entire life.

perhaps if dick cheney was a better shot than he might be in jail right now.

like Chris Rock said, okay have your guns, make bullets cost $5,000.00 a piece.

dubK,
i say we post more pictures of those who were slain because that could *hopefully* turn this thread back around to what this whole situation is really about- the loss of incredible, amazing, and talented life.

this is one person. one person shooting 30 or 40 people will not change anything. recognize the symptoms and take corrective action. we are a gun crazed nation, the only one i dare say with this kind of violence, so i can't believe that everyone that does this is crazy, but maybe that is what the press and the NRA want us to believe.

if that is the case then, isn't possible that everyone that has a gun and uses it also contain within them the same potential for crazy?

look, CNNMSNBCFOX are already there sucking the rest of the life that remains on that campus, we'll have enough of these portraits of lives lost too soon. it will go on for a week or two, and we'll get back to race issues, gonzogate and whatever is going on in Iraqistan.

This one is particularly heartbreaking.



Liviu Librescu, 76, was a Holocaust survivor, who his son said, will be remembered as a hero. He "blocked the doorway with his body and asked the students to flee," Joe Librescu told AP. "Students started opening windows and jumping out." The elder Librescu, a professor at Virginia Tech, was recognized internationally for his research in aeronautical engineering, the head of the Engineering Science and Mechanics Department at Virginia Tech told AP. He was born and received his advanced degrees in Romania.

so ummm, how easy is it to get a job in america w/ a bachelor degree from canada, cuz im having second thaughts about going to school in the us...

Hearing about the RA killed reminds me of how the first girl killed at columbine ended up being considered among the sweetest, friendliest people at the school who by most's account wouldn't have said or done a negative thing to anything or anyone (included tweedle dee and tweedle dumb)...yet fell victim to the 'all of you turned me to do this' mentality..really scary to think a person can just lose such a grip on reality that everyone ibecomes their enemy.

i'm tired of everyone calling him mentally ill...even if he was considered 'depressed'. I've seen real mental illness..this is just someone who let his years of built up anger and frustration take over and as someone stated earlier didn't let the voice to say 'no' speak up any more.

another spoiled rich kid who decided to generalize certain people his enemy and lash out against them is osama bin laden...he sure as shit didn't need a gun.

That is terribly sad WonderK. The man survived the fucking holocaust, and get killed by some asshole who seemed to be shooting at random (other than the two people from the dorm).

stourley.

agreed that you have the right to the first amendment and
to your opinions...but wouldn't it seem that common decorum
would ask that you stop spouting hate for a couple days
while people bury their dead?

agreed a debate needs to take place and changes should
happen, but there are other days and other venues in which
to make those changes happen.

this is not the appropriate thread for a flame war...

Maybe this shooter was just crazy? Whatever happened to just plain old crazy?

Why do we live in a society where nothing is anybody's fault, it's always someone elses? This country was founded off of an idea of indiviudual freedom which also equates to individual responsibility. So why is everything never the individual's fault? It's always the government, the culture, the movies, the videogames, the upbrining/parents, never the individual. You know, i'm beginning to buy this argument that while Americans have the freedom to own guns, some lack the responsibility. There are many gun owners in this country who own alot more destructive hardware than a couple of 9mm handguns and they don't go around killing people. Look, the guy who did this was an asshole and probably needed some serious mental help. It's not the government's fault for not passing enough laws, its not our fault for making violent movies, its his. This is not the proper thread for hateful rants and flame wars, people have died. May this thread die a quick death with that.

just to note: this thread wasn't meant to be about anything or anyone other than the incident at virginia tech and those affected- it was meant to be an update on the situation. a few took that to another level- and that is disappointing...

but some of us have tried to keep it focused. (thanks WK for posting pics + i posted the available names of the victims)

remember that people will read this--- people who may have been directly affected by what happened at VT. they should know we support them

Apurimac- I think you're absolutely right. 100% responsibility on the shooter, no question about it. But there is a distinction between an excuse and a reason. Is there any excuse? no. Are there reasons? Yes, and those reasons are likely worth exploring.

Oh yeah, i totally agree, and some of those reasons may have to do with environment, but I live in this "fucked up shithole" called America and I don't go around killing people, most of us "assholes" called Americans don't.

i am not a mental health specialist, but i wonder just how much research is being done into this relatively new phenomenon of the suicide via mass murder. it may not even be a new phenomenon, but it seems as though at one time a person may have comitted murder to become "famous." now it seems as though people want to off themselves but somehow feel the need to take as many people with them as they can.

well, fortunately the killer now has his picture plastered all over the front page of every single major news source's home page (in some cases spliced together with a fancy graphic...see foxnews..imagine that being your photoshop task for today)..

ahh, stardom.

you people make me sick.

(you know who you are and aren't)

lars, part of me agrees with you, but i was telling my wife this morning that i wish one, just one of those kids exploited this morning for the morning breakfast consumption and our entertainment, said to Meredith Veira - after one or two questions - just why are you bloodsucking media here to add insult to our pain?

why can't that happen.

a real dialogue cannot happen with everyone being nice. i don't know those families, i won't be at any funerals, i cannot comprehend their pain, nor will i try, but i will not delude myself into thinking that this discussion can wait another day or will happen after CNNMSNBCFOX leaves Blacksburg.

Stan, you can be angry, I think we all are. There's just a point when that anger becomes hateful and hurtful. We have to be responsible with our words, and while i wholeheartedly support your freedom to say "fuck you america" (i say it myself quite often), i don't think it's responsible to use language like that in discussing a recent tragedy like this.

kudos, stourley, for speaking your mind. there is no better time to be having this conversation no matter the bitterness of the language. in a few more days, we will be lulled back into don imus, american idol, and whatever other garbage is out there to distract us from issues that are actually meaningful to this country. the only positive thing to come from such tragedy is the possibility of growth and change.

nothing grows and nothing changes.

i will keep pushing until something changes or someone puts me in their crosshairs and shuts me up.

apparently abcnews has spouted that website as having the documents that the killer wrote during "creative writing classes" at VT.
--
Carolyn Rude, chairwoman of Virginia Tech's English department, is quoted as saying a colleague, Lucinda Roy, described Cho as "troubled." According to a report from the Associated Press, Roy was concerned enough about what Cho wrote in an assignment last year that she recommended he seek counseling.

TheSmokingGun.com has posted the text of a play, purported to be by Cho, which describes a 13-year-old boy who accuses his stepfather of pedophelia, and ends with the boy's death. In the play, titled "Richard McBeef," the boy talks of killing his stepfather.

change what?

I don't want to put words in Stourley's mouth, but I'm thinking when he says "fuck america" what he's saying is fuck us - fuck us for being so stupid, why is it that we can supposedly be the most advanced and powerful society in the world yet we can't even seem to take care of the most basic human needs and each other?

I have no answer for that.

I mean doesn't everyone here feel helpless right now?

it was one guy, not a nation that shot those poor people!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

we didn't pull the trigger LB, he did.

if you guys hate being american so much, i know a group of people in the middle east who share your concern, maybe you can go live in their peaceful land.