Terrible Shooting at Virginia Tech

[Godboo]

There was a terrible shooting today at the Viginia Tech campus today. So far there are 22 people reported dead, including the shooter.

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20070416/D8OHQA5O0.html

Pray for the victims and their families.

[STEED]

Just saw it on the news, another sad incident.

[UglyMowgli]

Sad news, the most terrible is that we never know exactly why he do this? (some witness says he was looking for his girlfriend).

http://news.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,30000-1260892,00.html

[HunterICX]

:( Damn, 22 deads.

what a sad day, I dont get those shootings on schools or other places with student involved, what have they done wrong?

HunterICX

[Heibges]

Almost unbelievabe. :nope:

[CCIP]

Bah, I feel all the more awful since this is a supposedly happy day for me (I got good news and it's a good freind's birthday) - but this, as always, dampens and puts things in perspective.

:(

Four days short of a Columbine anniversary, too.

[OddjobXL]

Ah, yes, Virginia. My home state. Why is it when we get into the international news it's always because someone shot off with a gun or at the mouth? Last good news to come from here was the election of Jim Webb.

[The Avon Lady]

Very sad and horrible.

[The Avon Lady]

Death toll at 32 from what I now hear.:cry:

[Kapitan_Phillips]

News like this cuts so much deeper when you have someone you care about in a school just like that. :down:

[The Avon Lady]

and where were the guns in defence today
As I linked to, they were banned from campus.

Initial video (http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=040_1176748241) (cell phone). Note reports of multiple incidents on same campus.

[ReallyDedPoet]

Just saw it on the news, another sad incident.

Very sad.

[ASWnut101]

Watching it now, 32-35 dead. Apparently, the man only had a 9mm pistol with alot of ammo. He lined them up and gunned them down. Terrible. :nope:


And for christ's sake! Can we keep the pro/anti-gun crap out of this? Make your own thread!:down:

[The Avon Lady]

And for christ's sake! Can we keep the pro/anti-gun crap out of this? Make your own thread!:down:
Gizzmoe closed it. :roll: :damn: :roll:

[ASWnut101]

Make another? Besides, that went a little off-topic, if I remember correctly.

:|\\

[CCIP]

Yes, please. No more gun debates here, this is inappropriate.

I should say I'm disturbed. Good thing BBC mentioned "Virginia Tech" right away; if the news said "university in Virginia", I'd have really freaked out. A really close friend of mine whose birthday happens to be today is a student at UVA.

[UglyMowgli]

A report from the Univerity staff:

http://www.vt.edu/campus_alert.php

[Gizzmoe]

waste gate had the great idea to bump an old guns thread (:roll:) and since it doesn´t make sense to have a gun debate in three different threads I´ve moved the guns debate posts from here and some from the "Dept Homeland security calls Gangs greatest threat to National Security???" thread to this thread:
http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=109983

[SUBMAN1]

waste gate had the great idea to bump an old guns thread (:roll:) and since it doesn´t make sense to have a gun debate in three different threads I´ve moved the guns debate posts from here and some from the "Dept Homeland security calls Gangs greatest threat to National Security???" thread to this thread:
http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=109983

You sure that is a good idea? Now the threads will all be screwed up and hard to read.

[Gizzmoe]

You sure that is a good idea? Now the threads will all be screwed up and hard to read.

It´s hard to please everybody, it was better than doing nothing at all.

[waste gate]

waste gate had the great idea to bump an old guns thread (:roll:) and since it doesn´t make sense to have a gun debate in three different threads I´ve moved the guns debate posts from here and some from the "Dept Homeland security calls Gangs greatest threat to National Security???" thread to this thread:
http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=109983

I was trying to help. My thought that the older thread was better than starting a new thread about firearms.

Sorry if it gave you a (:roll:) feeling.

[Gizzmoe]

I was trying to help. My thought that the older thread was better than starting a new thread about firearms.
The general idea wasn´t bad really, but when a discussion is already going in two threads it´s not helpful to bump a third one that´s about pretty much about the same.

[waste gate]

I was trying to help. My thought that the older thread was better than starting a new thread about firearms.
The general idea wasn´t bad really, but when a discussion is already going in two threads it´s not helpful to bump a third one that´s about pretty much about the same.

I hadn't looked at those other threads because the titles didn't interest me and I didn't know what was going on there. I saw micky bring up the firearm debate and your closing his thread and thought an older thread where I and many others had placed our positions on record would save everyone, including the mods, a bit of time.

[JetSnake]

Watching it now, 32-35 dead. Apparently, the man only had a 9mm pistol with alot of ammo. He lined them up and gunned them down. Terrible. :nope:


Probably catch flack for this but oh well. How did these people learn the behavior that in a situation like this you line up and take it? Can it be that ever since a majority of the victims probably grew up during the 90's that all that was ever drummed into their heads from the liberal educational system, is to not resist.

My flight instincts would have kicked in since the laws at the current time do not allow guns on campus, even though the perp had them. So whatever happend to people manning up and overwhelming this gunman, sure a few might have been sacrificed for the good of the rest, but what has happened to this society that resistance has become futile? Quite frankly that is more disturbing than some nut who was able to get a gun either legally, or illegaly.

[SUBMAN1]

Probably catch flack for this but oh well. How did these people learn the behavior that in a situation like this you line up and take it? Can it be that ever since a majority of the victims probably grew up during the 90's that all that was ever drummed into their heads from the liberal educational system, is to not resist.

My flight instincts would have kicked in since the laws at the current time do not allow guns on campus, even though the perp had them. So whatever happend to people manning up and overwhelming this gunman, sure a few might have been sacrificed for the good of the rest, but what has happened to this society that resistance has become futile? Quite frankly that is more disturbing than some nut who was able to get a gun either legally, or illegaly.

You sum it up correctly. The guy only had a pistol, so make a break for it! I would. Be scary to do, but better trying and dying, than just dying. Besides, it is impossible to hit things accurately that are over 20 feet with a pistol unless its motionless. This is why hunters and the military go at it with rifles.

[Kapitan_Phillips]

If it was a low quality one, just pull the slide off :P Then shove it up his ass.

(is biased)

[Platapus]

Probably catch flack for this but oh well. How did these people learn the behavior that in a situation like this you line up and take it? Can it be that ever since a majority of the victims probably grew up during the 90's that all that was ever drummed into their heads from the liberal educational system, is to not resist.

My flight instincts would have kicked in since the laws at the current time do not allow guns on campus, even though the perp had them. So whatever happend to people manning up and overwhelming this gunman, sure a few might have been sacrificed for the good of the rest, but what has happened to this society that resistance has become futile? Quite frankly that is more disturbing than some nut who was able to get a gun either legally, or illegaly.

Well having had guns pointed at me in anger, things change. It is damn scary to have someone point a gun at you. It is easy to say now what we would or would not do, but the shock and disbelief that overcomes you in that situtation changes your prespective.

I would not be too hard on the victims. This is a situtation that 18-24 year old college students are not usually prepared for (nor should they be)

[geetrue]

The guy only had a pistol, so make a break for it! I would. Be scary to do, but better trying and dying, than just dying. Besides, it is impossible to hit things accurately that are over 20 feet with a pistol unless its motionless. This is why hunters and the military go at it with rifles.

Faith and fear are a lot alike in the small amount of time that it takes to replace each other ... Click!
They are just alike ...

I suspect fear got them to all obey, even if it had of been a water pistol ...

Yes, it's sad and sadder still all of the crazy's that will want to imitate this act for who knows what reason ...

[bookworm_020]

I'm sad to hear of this mass shooting. We had one here over ten years ago, which caused as much shock here as some in America would be feeling now.

My thoughts are with them.

[Yahoshua]

*UPDATE*

http://www.suntimes.com/news/nation/343354,vatech041607.article

[CCIP]

Bizzare. Let's wait for more info, but to me it sounds like a guy who just lost it, with no real motive. A typical suspect profile for all these shootings in the last few years :(

[Tchocky]

*UPDATE*

http://www.suntimes.com/news/nation/343354,vatech041607.article

Dammit, I get enough scrutiny of my visa as it is....

[Yahoshua]

Like I said......this country is going to hell in a handbasket....and I want out of the basket.

[Kpt. Lehmann]

What on the planet could be so important, that some brave genius decides that killing UNARMED STUDENTS... (AGAIN) ...will fix a problem.

Twisted sack of crap murderer.

[NefariousKoel]

"Weak-minded" is how I'd classify this crap.

Your girlfriend breaks up with you over the weekend? You don't go killing everyone in the vicinity. No, you deal with life.

F*ckin' weak-minded p*ssies these days... grrr... and I'm not even that relatively old to notice such a change in trends of the past decade. :x

It seems suicide became suicide/homicide as the trendy thing to do. Selfish pr!cks.

[geetrue]

I can't understand where he was for two hours with two guns and a bunch of amunition on a cold winter kind of day. Plus the chains he had to lock the doors with ... spells pre-meditation to me. He wasn't even a student at Virginia Tech

Those people that jumped out of the windows were the lucky ones. The shooter caught several at the window trying to jump next.

Don't forget the heros that held the doors of one classroom shut with their feet, as the shooter came back and fired a couple rounds through the door because he couldn't get it open.

The lawyers are going to have a field day with this one ...

[NefariousKoel]

No matter their political outlook, if I were in any of their shoes I would've wished I was armed so as to fight back.

[Tchocky]

"Weak-minded" is how I'd classify this crap.

Your girlfriend breaks up with you over the weekend? You don't go killing everyone in the vicinity. No, you deal with life.

F*ckin' weak-minded p*ssies these days... grrr... and I'm not even that relatively old to notice such a change in trends of the past decade. :x

It seems suicide became suicide/homicide as the trendy thing to do. Selfish pr!cks.

This isnt something you can rationalise away. The gunman/men cant be said to be following a trend of weak-mindedness. Extreme pschological instability changes thought patterns and how the world is perceived. I wonder what we'll find out over the next few days

[NefariousKoel]

"Weak-minded" is how I'd classify this crap.

Your girlfriend breaks up with you over the weekend? You don't go killing everyone in the vicinity. No, you deal with life.

F*ckin' weak-minded p*ssies these days... grrr... and I'm not even that relatively old to notice such a change in trends of the past decade. :x

It seems suicide became suicide/homicide as the trendy thing to do. Selfish pr!cks.
This isnt something you can rationalise away. The gunman/men cant be said to be following a trend of weak-mindedness. Extreme pschological instability changes thought patterns and how the world is perceived. I wonder what we'll find out over the next few days
And just what is the cause of this "extreme psychological instability"? Is it random? Is it an improper upbringing? Chemicals in the brain? Taught that? Spoiled tantrum child?

I'm sure someone will come up with some lame excuse for the murderer. :roll: The victim society needs to take a walk.

[HunterICX]

"Weak-minded" is how I'd classify this crap.

Your girlfriend breaks up with you over the weekend? You don't go killing everyone in the vicinity. No, you deal with life.

F*ckin' weak-minded p*ssies these days... grrr... and I'm not even that relatively old to notice such a change in trends of the past decade. :x

It seems suicide became suicide/homicide as the trendy thing to do. Selfish pr!cks.
This isnt something you can rationalise away. The gunman/men cant be said to be following a trend of weak-mindedness. Extreme pschological instability changes thought patterns and how the world is perceived. I wonder what we'll find out over the next few days
And just what is the cause of this "extreme psychological instability"? Is it random? Is it an improper upbringing? Chemicals in the brain? Taught that? Spoiled tantrum child?

I'm sure someone will come up with some lame excuse for the murderer. :roll: The victim society needs to take a walk.


No excuse can give someone the right to kill innocent, I hate these days researches where they are going to try to dig in the shooters mind and what COULD have gone wrong, like they want to say to the others, well its bad, but the person had......issues:doh:. if he couldnt continue life or couldnt suck it up like a man, he should just have shot himself in place of the disaster he has created now.

also what I see a lot on TV are parents that kill the partner and children and then take their own life afterwards....just because they are in a crappy situation and they want it to be over...well the NEXT TIME just take out step 1 and step 2 (kill the children) and take your own life if you want that so badly, but leave the your surrounding, relative or childrens OUT OF IT.

my thoughts

HunterICX

[Tchocky]

And just what is the cause of this "extreme psychological instability"? Is it random? Is it an improper upbringing? Chemicals in the brain? Taught that? Spoiled tantrum child?

I'm sure someone will come up with some lame excuse for the murderer. :roll: The victim society needs to take a walk.
Excuse? I don't think we'll see an excuse. Reasons, yes, hopefully we'll know why this happened. But that's not an excuse.

The victim society here is made up of around 30 people..


No excuse can give someone the right to kill innocent, I hate these days researches where they are going to try to dig in the shooters mind and what COULD have gone wrong, like they want to say to the others, well its bad, but the person had......issues:doh:. if he couldnt continue life or couldnt suck it up like a man, he should just have shot himself in place of the disaster he has created now.
Of course he had issues, hence the shooting. Are you saying we shouldnt try to find out what went wrong? I'm confused

It's a dead end street, analysing depression/suicide using the logic of a level-headed mind

[HunterICX]

Ofcourse the reason might be researched, but dont the mental state of the shooter in such details ''that he might be abused by his parents at age 5, and that the first symptons of his violent nature is killing the neighbours cat at age 9'' and that it MIGHT! be the cause of todays action . and MIGHT this and MIGHT that or IT COULD be that and the amount of the word ''IF'' in such research is a whole lotta BS.

or just to make it short ''we cannot read minds''
we can guess, it but we never get 100% the background story of it.

also where has the ''he snapped/he just lost it'' term gone, its obvious he was looking for his GF , what did she do? well if she left him, you could already guess his state in those cases.

ofcourse the REASON why he has been shooting around has be researched indeed , but dont go dig in his mental state make a nice story of it.

[Letum]

Very sad that this, increasingly common, tragedy has happened to American students again.

[Skybird]

It cannot be excused, but surely it can be explained.

If the consequences of such explanations are welcomed, is something different.

[August]

In spite of what the media is saying the VT killings are not the biggest school massacre in US history:

The Bath School disaster attending the Bath Consolidated School. Their deaths constitute the deadliest act of is the name given to not one (as the name implies) but three bombings in Bath Township, Michigan, USA, on May 18, 1927, which killed 45 people and injured 58. Most of the victims were children in second to sixth gradesmass murder in a school in U.S. history. The perpetrator was school board member Andrew Kehoe, who was upset by a property tax that had been levied to fund the construction of the school building. He blamed the additional tax for financial hardships which led to foreclosure proceedings against his farm. These events apparently provoked Kehoe to plan his attack.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bath_School_disaster

[Godboo]

In spite of what the media is saying the VT killings are not the biggest school massacre in US history:

The Bath School disaster attending the Bath Consolidated School. Their deaths constitute the deadliest act of is the name given to not one (as the name implies) but three bombings in Bath Township, Michigan, USA, on May 18, 1927, which killed 45 people and injured 58. Most of the victims were children in second to sixth gradesmass murder in a school in U.S. history. The perpetrator was school board member Andrew Kehoe, who was upset by a property tax that had been levied to fund the construction of the school building. He blamed the additional tax for financial hardships which led to foreclosure proceedings against his farm. These events apparently provoked Kehoe to plan his attack.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bath_School_disaster
From what I've been hearing the media is saying that this is deadliest mass SHOOTING in US History.

[August]

From what I've been hearing the media is saying that this is deadliest mass SHOOTING in US History.

Then that would be wrong as well:

On Sept. 11, 1857, in a meadow in southwestern Utah, a militia of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or Mormons, attacked a wagon train of Arkansas families bound for California. After a five-day siege, the militia persuaded the families to surrender under a flag of truce and a pledge of safe passage. Then, in the worst butchery of white pioneers by other white pioneers in the entire colonization of America, approximately 140 men, women and children were slaughtered.

[Rilder]

Schools these days are just crap imho, if you aren't in the "Popular" croud your pretty much F#$Ked, glad I got out of there and went into "Online Highschool" or whatever... One time some A-hole tripped me and I landed straight on my front teeth, broke them both... we tried to go after the kids parents for money but it was more trouble then it was worth, the kids parents didn't do ****. Between these half-arsed kids and "In-croud" mentality, coupled with stress I'm actually surprised there aren't more shootings. But this is all in my experiances, you have no idea how much crap I got for not being a Christian.

[August]

Schools these days are just crap imho, if you aren't in the "Popular" croud your pretty much F#$Ked,

How exactly are you "F#$Ked"? Are you prevented from attending school or getting good grades? Seriously, is being part of a clique all that important?

[PeriscopeDepth]

On Sept. 11, 1857, in a meadow in southwestern Utah, a militia of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or Mormons, attacked a wagon train of Arkansas families bound for California. After a five-day siege, the militia persuaded the families to surrender under a flag of truce and a pledge of safe passage. Then, in the worst butchery of white pioneers by other white pioneers in the entire colonization of America, approximately 140 men, women and children were slaughtered.

Interesting you mention that, August. I just read about this in a book I'm reading. I guess if you really want to be correct you'd have to say the Virgina Tech shooting is the worst attack by a single gun man in US history?

PD

[August]

Interesting you mention that, August. I just read about this in a book I'm reading. I guess if you really want to be correct you'd have to say the Virgina Tech shooting is the worst attack by a single gun man in US history?

PD

Assuming it was indeed a single gunman then yes.

[Kapitan_Phillips]

Schools these days are just crap imho, if you aren't in the "Popular" croud your pretty much F#$Ked,
How exactly are you "F#$Ked"? Are you prevented from attending school or getting good grades? Seriously, is being part of a clique all that important?


Totally agree. I dont think this can be classed as a clique motivated attack. If so, I'm pretty "F#$Ked" as you put it, when I go study at Gordon College in Barnesville.

[Rockstar]

http://www.nypost.com/seven/04172007/news/nationalnews/va__tech_killer_revealed_nationalnews_.htm

Well, apparently, according to the New York Post he had written in red ink on one of his arms, the words “Ismail Ax” But what does this mean? The New York Post explores the question:

The reference may be to the Islamic account of the Biblical sacrifice of Abraham, where God commands the patriarch to sacrifice his own son. Abraham begins to comply, but God intervenes at the last moment to save the boy. In the Jewish and Christian traditions, the son is Isaac, father of the Jewish people; in Islam, it is his brother, Ismail (Ishmael in Hebrew). Abraham uses a knife in most versions of the story, but some accounts have him wielding an ax. A more obscure reference may be to a passage in the Koran referring to Abraham’s destruction of pagan idols; in some accounts, he uses an ax to do so.

First, as stated above, Muslims believe that they are the spiritual descendants of Abraham’s son Ishmael (or Ismail in Arabic) and not Issac. Issac is the father of, eh emm… the Jews. Muslims believe that it was Ishmael that Abraham was going to sacrifice and not Issac. So Muslims believe that they adhere to the faith of Abraham through Ishmael. And second, according to Islamic tradition, Abraham (Ibrahim in Arabic) in his early days of rejecting idolatry and paganism literally smashed the idols of his people with an ax. This was the definitive bridge burning event of Abraham’s early life. From that day forward, he was, according to Muslim belief, a Hanif - a worshipper of the One God. The story of Abraham’s smashing the idols with an ax may be read for instance at Islamicity here.

Ibrahim confronts his people and rejects their idols

He left his father after he lost hope to convert him to the right path, and directed his efforts towards the people of the town, but they rejected his call and threatened him. By Allah, he said, I shall plot a plan to destroy their idols. He knew that a big celebration was coming soon, where everybody would leave town for a big feast on the riverbank. After making sure that nobody was left in town, Ibrahim went towards the temple armed with an ax. Statues of all shapes and sizes were sitting there adorned with decorations. Plates of food were offered to them, but the food was untouched. “Well, why don’t you eat? The food is getting cold.” He said to the statues, joking; then with his ax he destroyed all the statues except one, the biggest of them. He hung the ax around its neck and left.

Or perhaps we are just jumping to conclusions here. Maybe Cho simply was trying to remind himself to buy an ax for his friend Ismail. So the killer had a clearly Islamic reference on his arm at the time of the murders. Is this enough to draw any conclusions? I would say not quite. But it needs to be discussed. There is no question that it strongly suggests that Cho had come under some Muslim influence. Did Cho Seung-Hui see himself as the ax of Ishmael? Something like this must be the case, otherwise he simply wouldn’t have written it on his arm before his rampage.

The New York Post article also provides us with evidence that Cho lived in a Muslim neighborhood:

Cho’s family lived in a two-story townhouse in Centreville, where neighbor Abdul Shash said the gunman played basketball and wouldn’t respond if someone greeted him. He was “very quiet, always by himself,” said Shash.

For now, we’ll just have to wait and see what else comes out.

[Tchocky]

Link? here's a boing Boing post on the phrase http://www.boingboing.net/2007/04/17/va_tech_mass_shootin.html


The New York Post article also provides us with evidence that Cho lived in a Muslim neighborhood:

Cho’s family lived in a two-story townhouse in Centreville, where neighbor Abdul Shash said the gunman played basketball and wouldn’t respond if someone greeted him. He was “very quiet, always by himself,” said Shash.

Okay, that may not mean all that much, Under****ingstatement of the year.
Basketball and a quiet kid. Yep, wahhabi all over the place.

[Yahoshua]

More news articles on the subject:

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8OICT580&show_article=1 (http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8OICT580&show_article=1)

http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/04/17/vtech.shooting/index.html (http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/04/17/vtech.shooting/index.html)

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/worldnews.html?in_article_id=449073&in_page_id=1811&ct=5 (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/worldnews.html?in_article_id=449073&in_page_id=1811&ct=5)

http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2007Apr17/0,4...Weapons,00.html

And might I point out that the firearm is Austrian made.....(hint hint).

[P_Funk]

I'm really finding the news coverage of this to be annoying. All day long its one interview after another with a "witness" thats almost in tears, or its another maudlin reporter sounding somber but not really exploring anything other than "its a tragedy".

I'd like to hear some talk of why the cops didn't respond without having to sit there for 45 minutes while they go through their sensation spiel. I know its traumatic but aside from my human compassion I want to know why the cops haven't learned how to react to this after so many other events and so on...etc...

I don't mean to offend anyone but I want some meat. Something thats more than just emotional sensation.

[Godboo]

I'm really finding the news coverage of this to be annoying. All day long its one interview after another with a "witness" thats almost in tears, or its another maudlin reporter sounding somber but not really exploring anything other than "its a tragedy".

I'd like to hear some talk of why the cops didn't respond without having to sit there for 45 minutes while they go through their sensation spiel. I know its traumatic but aside from my human compassion I want to know why the cops haven't learned how to react to this after so many other events and so on...etc...

I don't mean to offend anyone but I want some meat. Something thats more than just emotional sensation.

I'm finding the news reports more depressing than anything. I just flat out stopped watching the news yesterday cause I was always in a bad mood.

[_Seth_]

A truly sad and horrific tragedy..
My thoughts and condolances are with the families and friends of those killed...R.I.P..

[Tchocky]

http://www.debbieschlussel.com/archives/2007/04/is_this_ismail.html

eugh

[geetrue]

I'm finding the news reports more depressing than anything. I just flat out stopped watching the news yesterday cause I was always in a bad mood.

At first it was shocking news and they didn't even have advertising on ABC, but now it's a way to gratify the senses of people that need this kind of high, plus it helps pay the bills ... I'm sorry it happened and even more sorry that the warning of his own teacher (who saw it coming) couldn't prevent this horrible crime.

Click!