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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

#31

Post by nodemaker »

paraschopra wrote: post #27

I'm getting convinced about an interesting new theory on free will. Our free will isn't exactly "free", and is not certainly a conscious act. What we will is determined by the genetic predispositions and a historical interaction of the self with environment. This creates a feedback loop and the self takes one of the trajectories for which it is NOT responsible. Yet, the consequences of the actions are faced by the se…

This is certainly true of animals, but we as human beings do have the power to control the direction of the feedback loop.In other words we have the ability to decide how we respond to external stimuli, a truly unique ability in the animal kingdom.

"Man is not fully conditioned and determined but rather determines himself whether he gives in to conditions or stands up to them. In other words, man is ultimately self-determining. Man does not simply exist but always decides what his existence will be, what he will become in the next moment. By the same token, every human being has the freedom to change at any instant. Therefore, we can predict his future only within the large framework of a statistical survey referring to a whole group; the individual personality, however, remains essentially unpredictable"

- Viktor Frankl, Man's search for Meaning

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#32

Post by [deleted] »

coenhyde wrote: post #30
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 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.

[deleted]

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#33

Post by kiba »

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've lived in the US for 10 years, and I follow plenty of world news. It is clear that Columbine-like shootings are (with few exceptions) an American phenomenon. [1]

Um, what? I can cite two mass murder incident in Japan off the top of my head. There is the Osaka school massacre and the Akihabara massacre.

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#34

Post by olalonde »

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 personally don't have an opinion on gun control but it is pretty clear to me that easy access to guns is what stands out.

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#35

Post by objclxt »

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 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.

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#36

Post by [deleted] »

olalonde wrote: post #34
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 personally don't have an opinion on gun control but it is pretty clear to me that easy access to guns is what stands out.

[deleted]

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#37

Post by Ygg2 »

kghose wrote: post #20

I've read about killings before, I lived through 9/11, but for some reason these killings struck me really hard. Even more than school shootings. Perhaps because I think of the cinema as sanctuary - a place of make believe where we go to escape (move over places of worship!) but mostly because I wanted to really know motivations - why did he do it? Especially when it turns out he's not a person who tortured animals a…

Why is there a need to find out why? Killing spree is a lot like thunderbolt. It has no prediction why it struck, in the path it stuck.

If you only want to minimize risks of future murders, then don't read/watch the news. Each time a murderer has his/her face shown, she/he is glorified in even tiniest of ways (i.e. comic book villain), with a number of murders he/she committed put in front line, number of violent copycat acts will spike.

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#38

Post by corin_ »

[deleted] wrote: post #32
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.

[deleted]

Maybe... but two big differences.

First: I live in the UK. I've never wanted to kill someone. If I could legally buy a handgun and use it on a shooting range I would. Let's say someday I, for some reason, become a psycho and want to kill people. Right now I don't have anything like a gun to use, best I could come up with is a kitchen knife. Under US gun law, I'd have a glock, even though when I purchased it I had no intention of using it illegally.

Second: Imagine a psycho in a country where you can't own guns. He could buy a gun on the black market - hell, you can even do that online with bitcoins now - but a.) this creates a waiting time between when he wants to do it and when he can do it, during which he might change my mind and b.) there's a chance he might get caught while buying it - if it's legal to own and carry a gun, then he a killer isn't breaking a law until he starts killing, so a smaller chance of preventing him.

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#39

Post by kiba »

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 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 and then killed 4 individuals on foot. They were eventually arrested and sentenced to death.

If somebody was there with a gun, they could have engage the murderer in a firefight instead of defenseless people getting knifed or getting shot.

Re: Don’t Jump to Conclusions About the Killer

#40

Post by TazeTSchnitzel »

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.
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