Shooting at Oregon community college

Now is the only time to debate this, because before you know it it's forgotten, until the next shooting comes along.

There's a greater difference in cultures between European states than between American states, yes, but we don't have the violence problem the US has. So yeah, your point is correct.

That's a complete contradiction. Culture has changed so that everything is acceptable, but political correctness has taken over our speech to the point you cant be blunt anymore? Shouldn't that also be acceptable now since you first said the culture changed over the last 50 years to the point where everything is acceptable?

Nobody with a brain sees universal background checks "fixing" our culture. But to do nothing at all, as happened after Sandy Hook isn't sending the right message either.

And religion is a personal thing which has no place in the secular law of our country.

@GazaAli said:

@-God- said:

He was wrong though; this kind of mass violence doesn't happen anywhere in the world.

So then what exactly are we to be mourning over?

This stance that its too soon to talk about this issue because grieving is horse shit. Those families will be mourning and grieving their loved ones the rest of their natural lives, so spare me the BS empathy. This issue has gotten to be too routine for people to not discuss why are we doing NOTHING about Americans being killed on American soil.

Guys, that was sarcasm

@Aljosa23: i have no idea why US is not doing anything about their weapon laws

**** these idiots. if you want to kill yourself do it the normal way and eat a bullet in your bedroom. why try to take other people with you?

what an asshole.

I'm a bit miffed by the fact that while the guy has been confirmed to have been a Muslim targeting Christians, next to no media outlets are reporting anything of the sort. If it were the other way around, or race related, that would be the focus of every article for weeks to come.

@jamejame: exactfuckingly

Can you provide a link to your source? Haven't heard that angle.

http://nypost.com/2015/10/01/oregon-gunman-singled-out-christians-during-rampage/

As far as the man being Muslim, my source may have been wrong as I only just heard it being discussed on my local radio program, but I think the photos on his facebook speak for themselves.

http://gotnews.com/breaking-confirmed-chris-harper-mercer-is-26-year-old-muslim-killer-uccshooting/

Yeah, I'm starting to see the same stuff online. Not going to post links but just google 'oregon shooter muslim' and it appears people are tracking down his profiles/etc. Not confirmed yet, of course, so wouldn't put too much stock in that at this point. The same with all these kinds of stories, lots of misinformation so use discretion.

The shooter doesn't deserve recognition. His faith or party affiliation doesn't represent every single American. Instead, we should look to Chris Mintz who took 7 bullets trying to protect students by blocking a door way. And it was his birthday.

Happy belated birthday Chris Mintz.

Here's an article on the dude http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/oct/02/chris-harper-mercer-first-details-emerge-of-oregon-college-killer

No mention of muslim there.

he's probably atheist

Yeah it's to early to tell, but his facebook profile is odd...could be nothing or spoofed I guess.

Also this:

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/10/02/witnesses-say-oregon-gunman-targeted-christians-in-community-college-shooting/?intcmp=hpbt1

"The Oregonian newspaper that authorities had heard rumors that the gunman had issued "some sort of race-related manifesto" before the shooting."

I did see there were references to some racist comments he made online as well, wonder if more about this will come out?

What I have read is that he "hated [organized] religion".

But more information should be available later I suppose.

http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2015/oct/02/mass-shootings-have-no-impact-on-support-for-gun-rights-in-the-us

I think we need to reexamine how we evaluate these situations.

Some folks here were already clinging to the idea that he was Muslim, which somehow frames the motive in their mind.

Others have brought up mental illness, which is a scapegoat and also generally reserved for the white male offenders in these types of mass shootings (though in this instance he is mixed race). When Dylann Roof shot up the church, the first thing that came out of the everyones' mouth was mental illness. No one decided to call him a Christian terrorist for instance. This particular rant isn't how to prevent these types of situations; rather, how we perceive them and handle them. More often than not, I believe we are constantly skirting around the issues at hand by throwing out false flags.

Well, this is surreal. This topic got more than 100 replies without a peep about potential affiliations of the "gunman with mental illness". Some rumors go around trying to pin this on the cushy, guilt-free Islamic terrorism and we got fuckwits clinging to that. Anything but to have to deal with domestic terrorism, I see.

Human errors or human intents, the point is you blame the operators not the tools. It's easy to simply say that to reduce auto fatality we should ban cars or reduce gun violence we should ban guns, but the issue is far more complex and like the discussion with drugs and alcohol in the other thread, these type of knee jerk policy making tends to have unintended consequences which result in worsening of the issues.

Yes, because you know what the police WOULD prefer better than the cops themselves. [/sarcasm] You think people who shoot at police would care that there's a law against firearm ownership? Police recognize that gun control laws tip the favor to the criminals and are not effective at making their jobs safer.

Which bills are you referring to? People always have the right to defend themselves, regardless of the ones threatening them. Good police won't disagree with that.

As for 911, what you stated was pretty much the point. Whether guns are legal or not; gun or no gun, insane individuals still find ways of murdering others. You are not really addressing the cause of the issue by focusing the discussion on guns.

If someone mocks the notion of meeting God, then he is most likely an atheist.

Europe isn't a nation.

Does it matter? It's huge, has a single currency for the majority of its states, has law common to all the Union (though not to the extent of the US) and has a population in the hundreds of millions, same as the USA. For the purpose of this discussion, we can easily compare the EU to the USA, even if one of them isn't a country and the other is.

You said you believe the problem stems from the fact that the US is not culturally or socioeconomically homogeneous. Well I'm saying Europe is even less culturally and socioeconomically homogeneous, and yet it doesn't have the gun violence problem the USA has, which indicates these likely aren't the roots of the problem.

What is worse in Europe? US is way more ethnically diversified. Vast majority of Europe is overwhelmingly white.

There have been earlier posts referring to his mental state. Where the difference on opinion was whether it's actually mental illness or lack of guidance on how to deal with social issues.

Clearly we need more guns! MOOORE!

Yes. Take a large group of people from every European nation, then throw in a bunch from non European nations, and have them all live in Germany, then it would be a valid comparison.

And huge compared to what? Two of the largest U.S. states are larger than all of Europe.

I think you significantly underestimating the differences between US and EU and the role those differences play in how social policies affect each respective societies.

Okay... let's see, point by point. Sure, the USA's total area is about twice that of the European Union, but the EU's population is about 500 million people, while the USA's is under 350 million.

Where cultural diversity is concerned, right now the EU has 24 official and languages, while English is the de facto language in the USA, with some states accepting Spanish or French at most. In religion, the demograhics are more or less the same between the US and EU.

As for throwing a bunch of people from different places into a single country... Are you assuming immigration isn't a thing in the EU? Do you think we don't have Asian, Middle Eastern, African and South American immigrants here? Do you think there's no mobility whatsoever between the EU states?

I'm not entirely sure why it is you think the comparison between the EU and the USA isn't a valid one. Help me out of the confusion.

And that claim is based on...?

Also, I don't think ethnicity is solely determined by skin colour.

Also, many European countries have significant ethnic diversity, not in a small part due to a history of colonialism.

American exceptionalism. Americans think their country is special and above everyone else that successful policies which work in other places wouldn't work in the US because reasons. That's really all there is to it. If they admit that the comparison between the EU and the USA was valid that would by extension validate the call to have gun laws similar to Europe, or even Canada. And the gun nut culture doesn't want that.

Times are changing, but historically no, mobility is a vastly lesser factor in the lives of a typical European relative to an American. Far from being unusual, for most of America's history you were almost expected to die hundreds or thousands of miles away from where your parents were born and raised. Many of our largest cities, like L.A., Las Vegas and Phoenix, consist almost entirely of people born elsewhere. This constant disruption, combined with waves of immigrants for hundreds of years has led to an America that has successfully integrated large amounts of immigrants (basically, our entire population) from all over the world. This is not the same, nor even similar to the built over the centuries and millennium cultures of Europe, and explains why Europe has greater difficulty integrating all those immigrants from Asia, Africa, and the Middle East.

With that being said about integration and even because of its nature, in any given place and time in America, you can be surrounded by people who are not like you. Not like you racially, politically, in terms of their religion or cultural outlook and all of this can lead to greater than usual alienation of modern life. Being uprooted in general leads to instability and may offer a minor piece of the puzzle of our culture of violence.

Hmm good point. In fact thinkig about it, while there is mobility in the EU, language prevents it from being so easy, and is actually one of the reasons the Euro doesn't work as well as it could :P

Though now I gotta ask, wouldn't the fact that it's easier to integrate into different parts of the US mean there's far more a "common culture" across all 50 states, kinda defeating the purpose of the argument that these acts of gun violence are due to cultural differences and disagreements?

I mean you yourself have said it, Europe has a greater difficulty integrating immigrants, not only from outside the EU, but also from within the EU itself. I understand your point that Europe is more consisted of different but far more isolated cultures, but there still are immigrants and hence confronted* cultures, and yet, there isn't anywhere near the amount of gun violence there is in the states. Surely regulation has to do with this as a preventing factor.

*I say confronted for lack of a better word. I don't mean they are actually pitted against each other :P

Nope

Then he needs to address the real source of gun violence in this country. While mass shootings make all the big headlines, most gun deaths come from domestic violence or gang related crime. 10,000 ppl die a year in this country from that.

@bmanva said:

Nope

Fair enough, although I do want to point out that the related article states that the data is dated, that people in different countries might have different ideas about what constitutes a distinct ethnicity and that ethnicity is not just limited to race. Also, if you're talking about Europe as a whole, you really can't generalize all those different countries into one ethnicity. Still, I can imagine that the US houses large groups of people who identify as 'not American'.

@Master_Live said:

Says it all, doesn't it.

Mass shootings/murders happen all over the world.

Like Obamas speech

What a delightful slippery slope it is...
Who needs evidence and facts when you can just assume

With the US leading the way
God Bless America :')

@hrt_rulz01 said:

@Master_Live said:

Says it all, doesn't it.

Indeed.

It's all about the money. The NRA will lobby and fight against any regulation no matter how reasonable just to protect their income. They don't care about rights and freedoms except theirs to make as much money as possible. They fearmonger people into believing that they'll lose everything and that the government will come and take all their guns away.

Seems about right. Someone tries to stand up to it and has time to ask not to die while the rest stand back and watch. Within the classroom that guy was shot in, any that died afterwards are no consequence. About like all those worthless humans who watched that guy get stabbed to death, well over a dozen stabs, on a subway not too long ago.

Need to set up funds and make it known how much money you will get if you help "detain" these people when they do this. I'd say offer a dollar, but morally that's too much for the shooter's life.

Barack Obama response was spot on the mark imo.

A very good job emphasizing how ridiculous it has become.

@hrt_rulz01 said:

@Master_Live said:

Says it all, doesn't it.

I'm curious as to what exactly you think it says.

Man Can’t Believe Obama Would Use Tragedy To Push Anti-Tragedy Agenda

nailed it

@bmanva said:

@hrt_rulz01 said:

@Master_Live said:

Says it all, doesn't it.

I'm curious as to what exactly you think it says.

i suppose it says if we spend billions on anti-terrorism and terrorism deaths are pretty low, we need to spend billions more on keeping fuckwits from shooting each other and then we could reduce gun deaths in kind.

Threat of terrorism was never very substantial anyways, so you can hardly say that the reason why number of lives lost to act of terrorism is low is BECAUSE of the billions we spent on defending ourselves from terrorists. Plus it's a lot easier to fight terrorism overseas and prevent terrorists from coming into the country than it is to fight the criminals within the population since there are significantly more legal considerations and restrictions.

‘No Way To Prevent This,’ Says Only Nation Where This Regularly Happens

Twice