Ohio shooting

[hollohas]

There is surveillance video here. Shows people running, bullets apparently hitting pavement and police stopping him.


https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...passersby.html

PS - VERY impressive police response. Really great job.

The "eyewitness" account that a bystander was able to take his rifle and the BG transitioned to a pistol were inaccurate. He still has it in his hands when he went down.

[Irving]

I've mostly decided to not even say anything about any of these types of incidents. Not because I don't have anything to say, but because no one really cares for the most part. But, it's kind of cathartic for me when there's really nothing else I can do about things like this that are upsetting. So...

I don't believe this shooting, the one in El Paso, or any of the others are anything more than what they appear to be...the end result of a madman run amok.

Personally, I think these incidents are the result of a hatred so deep (the target of the hatred doesn't matter) that it basically just consumes the person. Combined with the hate is a remarkable lack of any sort of coping mechanism or any sort of logical thought process that might help with problem solving. It's a personal, mental flaw that is so profound it's difficult for "normal" people to process and understand. Frankly, I think that's why the conspiracy theories pop up and the blame game starts. It's a way for people to try to make sense of the non-nonsensical.

Does it really matter if the person is an Obama lover or a Trump hater, a republican or democrat, black or white? I don't think so. I don't think it matters a bit except it provides a convenient excuse for others to foment actions and emotions sympathetic with their pet cause.

It's just sad it comes to this with a small number of people. But the reality is it's always been this way with mankind. The weapons and the scale and the victims and the "cause" may change but the outcome is always the same.

I like this.

I think there are other things, possibly, in play as well that help shape what we're seeing now. Just a rough idea floating around in my head that isn't fully fleshed out, so bare with me. Essentially we, as a species, are having a difficult time adjusting to the internet and how it now allows us to interact and communicate with the entire world. With the internet, anyone and everyone can have a voice. This leads to people thinking that because they can have a voice, that they should have voice. You can see this with how comment sections on videos and news articles and whatever just turn into a cesspool. Everyone is saying something, just to be part of the conversation, regardless of if what they are saying merits any consideration or not.
I think what I'm trying to say is that in combination of what Bailey posted above about people taking an emotional roller coaster ride straight into the darkness, with no real coping mechanisms, this acting out might be an extension of spewing out garbage in a comment section, just to be heard. Of course not for every type of shooting. The guy who shot up his work probably wasn't trying to influence national politics, nor was the guy in Ohio who got denied from a bar. But people like the El Paso shooter who wrote a manifesto and thinks he's got the answers, but if only someone would listen to him, definitely. Which is sad because his manifesto is a mess and just reading it you can tell that he should be washing dishes and not trying to tackle national economic policy.

I would not dare lay the sole blame on anyone thing (well except the person pulling the trigger), but I feel like there is a long list of things that influence and nudge people to do things like this.
- The media churning out garbage click bait articles/stories/pieces, etc to keep up with a 24-hour news cycle.
- Politics that have degraded so far that candidates are taking the social pulse of society to try and win elections like a popularity contest instead of actually ever trying to solve anything.
- The news cycle constantly highlighting how bad everything is to the point that no one feels like the government is capable of solving any problem at all, so people better act on their own.
- The government not being capable of actually solving problems.

[Irving]

And for the first time, narcissists could openly hate the country and work to destroy it from the inside. Previously such things would have been dealt with swiftly. This counter-culture got us abortion, STDs, Iran/ME crisis, critical race theory, and environmentalism. It provided the genesis for collectivist thought and so many modern collectivists still pull from that period.

Those were all reactions to other bad things though. STDs have been around since the beginning of time for instance. The reason powdered wigs were even created was because of an STD. Critical Race Theory sounds like a reaction to Eugenics. Environmentalism a reaction to hundreds of years of no regulation in pretty much any industry. Between things like strip mining doing irreparable harm to the natural land that we rely upon and doing things like mass poisoning animals to prop up the domestic sheep industry (that barely even exists today anyway), Environmentalism seems a pretty natural reaction.

I'm not trying to defend any of those concepts, especially where some of them are now, just trying to make the point that none of those things just appeared out of whole cloth by people trying to ruin the country.

[hollohas]

Both the Ohio and the El Paso killers were wearing hearing protection. Anyone recall any other massive shootings that the BG wore hearing protection??? Seems so weird to wear hearing protection when you are expecting to die.

[Irving]

I thought the same thing. I'm not sure what to think about that. Sure helps the case for premeditation though.

In a completely messed up way though, it could be argued that people are taking general gun safety more seriously in general. Like people committing vehicular homicide while wearing a seat belt.

[Gman]

Like your post BG.

Another aspect that I think comes into play is the encouragement into activism for kids growing up. Whether it's 'saving the planet' or a political agenda, we have young individuals that think they have the answers, but don't have enough life experience to understand the realities.

[Rucker61]

Not a fan of his, but this tweet is pretty accurate. And he's getting ripped apart for it.

The data doesn't support the narrative or the emotional response. Ask a gun control advocate if "assault weapons" used in mass shootings is our biggest concern with gun violence, and when they say "of course", ask them why the 20 year annual average of less than twenty dead mass shooting victims is more of a priority than the 1000 black teens and children murdered by other Black people, or the 22,000 suicide victims every year?

[Gman]

The great minds of our time have spoken:
Celebrities Demand Gun Control Amidst Multiple Shootings: ‘It’s About Life and Death’

[FoxtArt]

Both the Ohio and the El Paso killers were wearing hearing protection. Anyone recall any other massive shootings that the BG wore hearing protection??? Seems so weird to wear hearing protection when you are expecting to die.

To be completely honest, I'm surprised that crazy's haven't figured out the advantage before.

Do you ever train without hearing protection? Probably not. The second you take them off, the anticipation of the hearing-damage level DB can start to affect your accuracy, especially if you keep doing it. On top of that, your awareness will become limited as the "pressure" builds in your ears and your hearing temporarily dampens. Digital ear muffs... might look silly, but there's sadly no disadvantage to it.

It's also entirely possible the second one saw pictures of the first one. And there's some real possibility that the quick succession is motivated by crazy on the knife edge, who realized the opportunity the press would give them to stack the infamy more than they could do independently.

[Irving]

The data doesn't support the narrative or the emotional response. Ask a gun control advocate if "assault weapons" used in mass shootings is our biggest concern with gun violence, and when they say "of course", ask them why the 20 year annual average of less than twenty dead mass shooting victims is more of a priority than the 1000 black teens and children murdered by other Black people, or the 22,000 suicide victims every year?

It's not difficult to figure out why indiscriminate shootings are scary to people. It's the indiscriminate part. Like all things, there are narratives attached to all kinds of events. Suburban white people assume that black people getting killed by the thousands are, at worst, asking for it by running with the wrong crowd and/or living a life of crime, or, at best, trapped in a desperate social situation/location where they are unfortunate victims of the first reason.

Suicides are people with problems that couldn't be overcome, were missed by loved ones, etc, etc, but either way are an indication of a personal problem.

With indiscriminate shootings, your own well balanced, socially adjusted, non-criminal kid could still be shot down by someone else, even when you did all the things right.
Also, indiscriminate shootings are largely carried out by white shooters in areas that aren't necessarily high crime areas.

Statistics stop mattering when you become one. Very few people are struck by lightning each year, but you sure bet people still try to avoid it whenever possible.