My heart goes to the families and friends of all the victims.
If there is a hell, I hope this Son of a bitch gets a prime spot.
Just an absolute waste.
And once again the talking heads on TV are arguing about gun control. Gun control or no, people with mental problems will probably be able to obtain guns if they want them. When will we have a serious discussion about mental illness? The negative stigma and lack of understanding about it by society in general leads people to pretend it doesnât exist; hide it. And then hope the person gets better before something likeâthatâhappens.
What also disturbs me about this story is that the name of the school and the town are familiar. I may have done a circus program there in the late 80s/early 90s. We always like going to Connecticut; it was always so nice. Beautiful, nice people, nice kids!
John, mental illness, like guns, will always be present and there will always be cases that go neglected. Treating mental illness and removing stigma are of course necessary for any civilized society. Keeping guns out of the hands of the mentally ill is equally important.
I doubt very much that the treatment and care of the mentally ill will ever be sufficient any more than the availability of guns will ever be sufficiently and properly controlled. But these are not isolated and individual problems. They are related and interconnected and complementary. One, it seems to me, can not be addressed at the neglect of the other.
How mad is mad?
Copycats of amok manifestations tend to multiply.
Perpetrators have fans (Anders Breivik receives hundred of letters from supporters and admirers!)
The mere act of killing people is disconnected from any form of empathy: playing video games where we shoot at everything which is moving is mere play ⌠why should it be different in real life? try to imagine a video game where the player has just to please a loved one and the game will be banned! culture favorise Thanatos over Eros!
So now if I kill I exist in the eye of the world!
Great people did that before me and are now celebrities ⌠look there are statues of Gengis Khan or Napoleon Bonaparte!
Is there a culture that favorise âmadnessâ ?
This kind of thing happens far more often in the USA.
One failed attempt at a shoe bomb and we all take off our shoes at the airport.
Another school shooting and nothing changes.
My Opinion, most ideas or plans start off as a good honest attempt to make life or a situation better. Others later figure out loopholes or weaknesses and use to this to their personal advantage until its an unkillable monster.
A couple examples.
Wellfare: Wonderful idea until everybody and their brother got on it and now itâs wrong to make these people find work.
UnionsVery much needed in the beginning but the greed of a few has hurt the many in most cases.
Child abuse Child abuse is a very real problem. Spanking a child that is being a butthead is not abuse. The do gooders have ran this to a point where parents are afraid to discipline the kids.
If I recieved âTalksâ after doing my normal kid screw-ups I would of turned out to be a monster. Instead a swat was given, I cried, life went on.
I think kids raising themselves is a bad idea, and in the USA that happens alot. Maybe the rest of the world has more input with the kids.
The fact that a 20yr old slipped thru the cracks doesnât surprise me at all.
Come thru my town at 3am on a school night and kids are out and about.
Where are the parents in thier lives? Too bad, just wait, the next generation should have even less supervision. Sad, very very sad.
Did you have a direction or something in mind?
Too true, Billy, far too true.
I work in a mental health facility and just last week we were discussing the need for increased security, stressing the importance of having better control over who is walking our halls.
We already have a âno firearms on campusâ policy, but thereâs have no way to control what we canât see. I suggested a metal detector at the door with a silent alarm so that our on-site security could be notified.
I was literally laughed out of the room:
âThatâs too expensive!â
âWhat will we do if someone has a weapon?â
âYou canât just tell people to leave if they have a weapon.â
We had our own shooting at a local ER just a couple years ago, but did we do anything about it? Nah, it wonât happen again, âthese are isolated eventsââŚ
At what point will we do what needs to be done?
Iâd be suprised if the parents of the dead children are not now in favor of stronger gun control.
So maybe when enough children are killed, maybe when enough politicians are assasinated, maybe when everyone knows someone who has been assaulted or killed by a gun, maybe then weâll do the right thing.
And Americans wonder why the rest of the world thinks weâre a bloodthirsty society.
Twenty little kids who will never sit in Santaâs lap, who will never know a first kiss, who will never help make this world a better place.
And that special place that Jona mentioned, it should be reserved for anyone who owns a gun.
Itâs a far bigger USA problem than in Europe, etc.
American children are 16 times more likely to be murdered with a gun, 11 times more likely to commit suicide with a gun, and nine times more likely to die in a firearm accident than children in other industrialized countries.
Is it because THE OTHER NATIONS are successfully doing something about it?
Woah now. Iâm just a naive teenager, and while I donât own a gun or support gun ownership, the mere possession of a gun doesnât make you an evil person.
It doesnât even make you a bad person.
That said, there needs to be regulations so that combination can not exist. A responsible, well-meaning person has every right to bear arms, but we must establish securities and standards so they are the ONLY people bearing arms.
Whereâs the damn Like button? Arg, this is not Facebook. Well said.
I would be worried if the government and the criminals (sorry, am I being redundant?) were the only people with guns.
Anyway, take away the guns and the crazy person will just make a few homemade pipe bombs â then run down the hallway and throw one into each classroom. Guns are not the problem. Unfortunately, sick people will find a way (on the other hand, at least if they are making pipe bombs, there is the possibility that they will blow themselves up before getting the opportunity to kill other people).
You think too short. It costs way more (criminal) energy to build a bomb than to get the gun out of your motherâs drawer in a moment of mental illness like a deep depression.
Sure, it will always be possible to obtain a weapon. But it must be made as difficult as possible.
WHat freaks you out more, a society where guns are banned or a society where the authorities have the power to declare you âunstable and unfit to own a gunâ?
A slight difference, but one of massive importance.
Frankly, Iâd rather have a âlevel playing fieldâ and take my chances.
[edit: this is in regard to reading the names and ages of the victimsâŚ]
Dave, that was quite powerful and moving. It brought tears to my eyes. The death toll is so staggeringly high â especially considering it was mostly children â that the number becomes incomprehensible, a lump sum of such unthinkable tragedy and horror that the mind, it seems, resists trying to comprehend because it is so awful and so painful to think about. We need a way to break it down to a human scale. It also seems quite wrong that they remain anonymous, nameless victims. Very well said and very nicely done, Dave.
Imagine if the TSA were in schools. 
Billy likes to stir the pot. Knowing this, Iâll respond to that one anywayâŚ
Quite a bit has changed since Columbine, at least. The school had a procedure for âLockdownâ. Teachers knew what to do and moved immediately to protect the kids. This likely saved many lives.
I donât think that such prejudice is prevalent: we should think globally in this world. What worries me is a global view on violence disconnected from consequences that pervades many cultural trends in the world at large.
There is a big difference between violence in traditional myths or even children tales (yes! those served educational purposes) and much of what you see on TV, films, video games and some political prose âŚ
Violence is not taboo, but disconnected from context it becomes a senseless addiction.
Do the people of France, England, and other nations have the RIGHT to own automatic weapons?
In the USA, the ârightâ primarily serves a $billion firearms industry. The NRA is the lobbying are of that industry.
The NRA lobbies so that USA citizens have the right to own assault weapons and cop-killer bullets.
2 problems we have here as a society. Turning a blind eye and Lack of knowledge. We turn a blind eye towards raising our own children and blame the schools, media and anyone else. Rather than admit we work too much and are away to often to pay for toys rather than family. Hard truth nobody wants to admit. Thatâs why the economic fall, we all owed everybody.
Lack of knowledge is what kept the wizard in charge of Oz. Lack of knowledge keeps firearms in a magical place. Automatic weapons espesially have powers almost magical. This is really bullpoop. There is no magic, just some metal and plastic. Just another tool. Most parents hide and donât teach children about weapons so this increases the lure of the magic. Knowledge from a very young age would be a tremendous help. I, like many others have been patiently waiting to see an automatic weapon do something by itself, but so far nothing. Still needs somebody to opperate it. I agree more security at schools and hospitals is a must. That is the end tho, we need to work on the beginning.