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Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

nytimes.com

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Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#71

Post by base698 »

kiba wrote: post #55
coenhyde wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know American's do not like to hear this but I am of the opinion that it's easy access to guns which is the cause of these mass murders. Now that Australia has gun control, the crazy's just stab a few people. It's very hard to kill so many people with a knife. If you take away easy access to guns then sure the hard criminals will still have guns but the wannabe criminals and the lunatics will do less damage.

If you take away easy access to guns then sure the hard criminals will still have guns but the wannabe criminals and the lunatics will do less damage. Taking away legal access != eliminating easy access to guns. It still may well be the case that it is easy to buy guns on the black market. On the other hand, you also disarm the population, making them easier target for mass murderer.

It works so well with drugs. I mean they are illegal and you can't buy them on the street--oh wait.

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#72

Post by grandalf »

It's just a complete waste of time to think about these kinds of things. Some humans malfunction and do this kind of thing. It happens quite rarely, and there is nothing that can be done to stop it. One's probability of being harmed by the occasional insane murderer (or terrorism for that matter) is microscopic compared to so many other things that we can actually do something about.

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#73

Post by Spooky23 »

tokenadult wrote: post #64

From the submitted article: "At this very moment, the police have probably gathered a great deal of evidence from James Holmes. They may well have a clear read on his motives right now. It is vital that they share this information fully with the public, but just as vital that they conceal much or all of it while they conduct their investigation. Testimony from friends, family and survivors of the massacre is also cru…

I'd argue that prosecutors pandering for votes are worse than the cops in terms of information leakage.

And while laws limiting access to firearms may be part of a longer term solution, we should be exploring limiting the celebration of sadism that modern Hollywood has become.

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#74

Post by kiba »

leot wrote: post #62
kiba wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US certainly has a higher frequency of apparently motiveless mass murders, but I think it is fairly certain that this is due to easy access to weapons. Someone who is mentally unbalanced is probably going to kill fewer people with a knife before being stopped than with a gun. In Japan, one mass murderer kills 8 Japanese schoolchildren with a knife. In another incident, a mass murderer kills 3 people with a truck…

The amount of determination required to do that much killing with a knife would have had its effects amplified by the ready availability of a gun. You think some person with a handgun would stand much of a chance against someone in body armor with an assault rifle?

You think some person with a handgun would stand much of a chance against someone in body armor with an assault rifle?

It would not be certainty a fair fight. Even so, a murderer is forced to engage civilians who are shooting at them rather than civilians who are simply defenseless. The only thing a person with handgun can do is buy time for a SWAT team to arrive and the slower the SWAT are, the more likely for death. (See the North Hollywood shootout as an example of this)

Nonetheless, I consider the defenders having guns to be an equalizer. In the Virginia Tech massacre incident, the murderer have only two handguns, but he was able to kill 32 individuals.

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#75

Post by tomjen3 »

japhyr wrote: post #2

I cringe every time I hear perpetrators of mass shootings described as "evil". Evil implies a presence of something bad. It's an easy label that allows people to hate the perpetrator. It's much more accurate to describe the perpetrators as cold, empty, detached. That is frightening, because there is no hope of reasoning or bargaining with someone who is truly detached from emotion. There is no such thing as evil. I a…

Can we use the term 'defect', then?

As in "the computer was defect, so I put in the junk heap"?

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#76

Post by heyitsnick »

objclxt wrote: post #35
arturadib wrote: post #26

Think outside the box. I've lived in the US for 10 years, and I follow plenty of world news. It is clear that Columbine-like shootings are (mostly) an American phenomenon. [1] So what is it so special about the US that makes this a recurring problem? Is it poor parenting, without much communication? Is it societal pressure, i.e. Mr Popular vs Mr Loser? Is it easy access to guns? Is it the disproportionate amount of m…

I don't think it is clear at all that "Columbine-like shooting are an American phenomenon". The UK has had several massacres where in each case over a dozen were killed with no apparent motive (Dunblane in 1996, Cumbira in 2010), and there have been several smaller scale incidents along similar lines. The same is true in other countries around the world - I'm just citing those I'm most familiar with. The US certainly…

> The UK has had several massacres where in each case over a dozen were killed with no apparent motive (Dunblane in 1996, Cumbira in 2010), and there have been several smaller scale incidents along similar lines.

This is disingenuous. There have not been 'several cases where over a dozen were killed, and several smaller scale incidents'. There have been exactly three in recent UK history: Dunblane (16 schoolchildren killed, and has to be the worst criminal act in modern UK history), Cumbria (12 adults in a lone gunman killing spree), and the Hungerford Massacre in 1987 (16 murdered by lone gunman).

Going further back, there is the Shepherd's Bush murders in 1966 (3 policemen and 2 members of the public shot dead) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shepherd%27s_Bush_murders as a possible example of 'several smaller scale incidents along similar lines.' But this is hardly how you phrased it.

Now look at the United States list as a comparison: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_massacres_in_the_United...

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#77

Post by aangjie »

etherael wrote: post #6
japhyr wrote: post #2

I cringe every time I hear perpetrators of mass shootings described as "evil". Evil implies a presence of something bad. It's an easy label that allows people to hate the perpetrator. It's much more accurate to describe the perpetrators as cold, empty, detached. That is frightening, because there is no hope of reasoning or bargaining with someone who is truly detached from emotion. There is no such thing as evil. I a…

> That is frightening, because there is no hope of reasoning or bargaining with someone who is truly detached from emotion. This position is strange, you think the only position from which you can reason or bargain with another person is if they are emotionally attached? I purposely try as hard as I can to live a life completely free of emotional entanglement, I think emotion is largely useless. By this measure I sup…

As another commenter pointed out it may not be possible, but it certainly is "more useful" in most everyday situations. System 1 type thinking vs System 2 type thinking(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual_process_theory) is relevant here.

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#78

Post by bluekeybox »

japhyr wrote: post #2

I cringe every time I hear perpetrators of mass shootings described as "evil". Evil implies a presence of something bad. It's an easy label that allows people to hate the perpetrator. It's much more accurate to describe the perpetrators as cold, empty, detached. That is frightening, because there is no hope of reasoning or bargaining with someone who is truly detached from emotion. There is no such thing as evil. I a…

Cold, emptiness, and detachment is also characteristic of snowmen. Snowmen usually don't commit mass murders. There has to be some other factor, and usually that other factor is aggression of a type where you stick pins into a voodoo doll and derive pleasure from doing that. That is what Christians call evil (deriving pleasure/release from inflicting pain), and it is a pretty specific concept actually. You don't have to be Christian or even believe in supernatural to understand it.

I noticed that people who claim that evil doesn't exist simply have a completely messed up (I suppose, by schooling) moral compass, and they have no idea how common that aspect of human personality is (and that it nearly always has negative consequences both for the bearer and for society at large).

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#79

Post by protomyth »

TazeTSchnitzel wrote: post #40
arturadib wrote: post #26

Think outside the box. I've lived in the US for 10 years, and I follow plenty of world news. It is clear that Columbine-like shootings are (mostly) an American phenomenon. [1] So what is it so special about the US that makes this a recurring problem? Is it poor parenting, without much communication? Is it societal pressure, i.e. Mr Popular vs Mr Loser? Is it easy access to guns? Is it the disproportionate amount of m…

The US has a large population and media that tries to scare people. I don't think it's any more common in the US than elsewhere, we just hear about it more from the US since it has a larger population.

Worse, we hear about it 24/7 until the next thing comes along to peak the interest of the media. We don't hear a lot about the 14 things higher on the list of things killing people in the USA (which affects their funding in Congress).

Hell, the rush in the media is so obscene that major news networks make stuff up. ABC seems to be the most guilty party this time, but we have had other incidents.

We have a no attention span media and it does hurt because we cannot get a good idea of what actually went on, and will never no if there is some warning sign that could of tipped people off (like the whole AZ shooting seems to be a collection of not my problems).

I have no idea how we get past this. Concentrating on the object (gun in this case) will not work (check out IED or actual crime rate statistics). Looking at the stats, your safer today then 10 years ago and much safer than the 1970s.

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#80

Post by Alex3917 »

rauljara wrote: post #49

"Psychologists describe depression as anger turned inward." Correction: Freud described depression as anger turned inwards. Specifically, he described anger at external forces (your mother, etc.) turned inwards. In his view, the only way to get rid of depression would be to allow this anger to express itself against the actual external force. This is very, very far away from the majority view of modern psychology (wh…

"This is very, very far away from the majority view of modern psychology (which has dismissed the vast majority of Freudian thought), but I still hear it repeated all the damn time."

Actually a lot of therapists still use personal mythology construction as a therapy tool, which is very similar to Freud's idea of directing anger outward in the sense that both creating a new identity for the person or strengthening their existing one. It's basically the same idea but expanded a bit and better explained. If you search for personal mythology on Amazon there are all sorts of books about this.

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