Are school shootings simply the result of capitalism?

[ineverpost]

It's because of digital. A lot of people will do anything to get attention no matter the cost. A lot of kids first thoughts during the shooting was to pull out their phones and take videos for subscribers. In a way this can be attributed to capitalism, since attention often times equals money, although there are many different countries where you can use social media. I think for many kids, they see the glamour being sold on Instagram and think that if you don't have that kind of attention, you're a failure.

 

[Grenz]

Let me ask ya a question as a former “ban guns solve everything” person...

We now live in a world where people get into trucks and plow into crowds...

If someone wants to kill lots of people, its likely gonna happen.

So my argument now is why are people getting to that point that they want to kill lots of people?

Figure that out and you solve the problem.

Pretty difficult to drive into a school and kill people. It's a false equivalence.

 

[Neph]

Alyssa Alhadeff, soccer player

Alyssa, 14, was a student at Stoneman Douglas and a soccer player for Parkland Travel Soccer.

Lori Alhadeff, Alyssa's mother, told HLN she dropped her daughter off at school Wednesday and said "I love you." When Lori Alhadeff heard about the shooting, she hustled to school, but was too late.

Scott Beigel, teacher

Beigel, a geography teacher, was killed as he tried to usher students back into his classroom when the shooting broke out. Kelsey Friend, one of Beigel's students, told CNN in an emotional interview that he was shot outside the classroom door and that he saved her life.

Nicholas Dworet, star swimmer

Dworet, a 17-year-old senior, was killed in the shooting, the University of Indianapolis confirmed. Dworet was recruited for the university swim team and would have been an incoming freshman this fall.

Aaron Feis, football coach

"He died the same way he lived -- he put himself second," she said. "He was a very kind soul, a very nice man. He died a hero." Colton Haab, a 17-year-old junior who had a close relationship with Feis, told CNN he saw the coach running toward the sounds of gunshots.

Jaime Guttenberg, student

Jaime, 14, was among the victims, according to a Facebook post by her father, Fred.

"My heart is broken. Yesterday, Jennifer Bloom Guttenberg and I lost our baby girl to a violent shooting at her school. We lost our daughter and my son Jesse Guttenberg lost his sister.

Chris Hixon, athletic director.

His widow, Debra, was telling CNN that he was "probably the best man that I ... " when she couldn't go on.

Luke Hoyer

Luke, 15, was "an amazing individual. Always happy, always smiling. His smile was contagious, and so was his laugh," his cousin, Grant Cox, said.

Cara Loughran

Cara Loughran, 14, danced at the Drake School of Irish Dance in South Florida. "Cara was a beautiful soul and always had a smile on her face," the dance studio said in a statement. "We are heartbroken as we send our love and support to her family during this horrible time."

Alaina Petty

Petty's family said she was vibrant and determined. She had volunteered after Hurricane Irma hit Florida in September. "Alaina loved to serve," the statement from her family said. She was also a part of the "Helping Hands" program of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Meadow Pollack

Pollack, 18, had been accepted at Lynn University in Boca Raton. Spokeswoman Jamie D'Aria said: "Meadow was a lovely young woman, who was full of energy. We were very much looking forward to having her join our community in the fall. "

Martin Duque Anguiano 14, Peter Wang 15, Carmen Schentrup 16, Helena Ramsay 17, Gina Montalto 14,Joaquin Oliver 17 were all named as a victim of the shooting by Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel at a news conference.

 

[ineverpost]

Not sure we can pin it exclusively on capitalism.

Often just as teens become men their psychosis peaks at the very time they're supposed to stand on their own legs and are, legally, independent.

They get pushed out of their jobs, their schools and set adrift because you can't force an 18 yr old to do anything.

At the same time they might haphazardly go off their meds in a totally unsupervised fashion.

We need loony bins for these guys to protect us and them. I don't mean a cruel mad house with shock therapy but rather internment at a mental hospital. This costs money but it's time as a society that we step up and pay for them.

Still, if the teachers, professors and school psychologists all recommend it how can we legally force an 18+ yr old into such a facility? Tricky question.

Some like Dylan Klebold (not Harris) could have been pulled back into the human family while others like The Question Mark killer need special full time care at a facility for life.

We need to bring back insane asylums because "mental health" is largely bullshit and the treatments are random prescriptions that benefit big pharma more than patients. Violence is a natural human behavior, simply saying someone is "mentally ill" because they did something violent is lazy, and defining of a society that wants to fix a problem as quickly and cheaply as possible, while maximizing profit. That's why "mentally ill" get sent to private prison or prescribed medication with highly questionable efficacy (and also carries a black label suicide warning for anyone who doesn't read the drug info inserts on their prescriptions). More telling is that any national discussion on the subject is simply used a political rallying tool, either to deflect blame from big political donors (NRA) or to call for more government on issues that don't even have much to do with the problem.

 

[machidafan99]

No. There's people that are bat shit insane. And while some of the more recent diagnosis that any shy person has aspergers is silly there are still crazy people.

Look at the Question Mark Killer? His life long use of false mutism wasn't merely beta male, incel behavior. He was facking nuts and needed full time care at a mental institution.

There's a long list of crazies that did horrible things. So while, yes, big pharma is big business let's not be naive and pretend mental illness does not exist.

We need to bring back insane asylums because "mental health" is largely bullshit and the treatments are random prescriptions that benefit big pharma more than patients. Violence is a natural human behavior, simply saying someone is "mentally ill" because they did something violent is lazy, and defining of a society that wants to fix a problem as quickly and cheaply as possible, while maximizing profit. That's why "mentally ill" get sent to private prison or prescribed medication with highly questionable efficacy (and also carries a black label suicide warning for anyone who doesn't read the drug info inserts on their prescriptions). More telling is that any national discussion on the subject is simply used a political rallying tool, either to deflect blame from big political donors (NRA) or to call for more government on issues that don't even have much to do with the problem.

 

[Phelly2]

What's the cost of freedom and how does it weigh against innocent people getting shot up at school? Serious question. You mention self defense, but you don't really need a rifle or a whole closet full of them to defend yourself, no?

I could argue this, but I'm willing to cede the point if you're willing to follow my logic here:

If I'm right, gun control alone will not have the effect people want in the time frame that they want it. For example, if the popular "assault weapons ban" goes through, I think people are going to be very disappointed at the results. And they're not going to say, well, here are your guns back. They're going to say, OK, then we need to take all your guns. And that's not going to work either. Just like it hasn't worked in Chicago, just like it doesn't work in the gun free zones that are public schools.

To be honest, I'm not educated on the pros and cons of public swimming pools.

Haha. Fair enough. Neither am I. I just brought it up as a logical equivalent minus the emotional element.

I'm happy you're not in favor of school shootings. What's your proposed solution? Btw I don't think banning guns is the answer, but gun accessibility needs to be looked at.

Honestly, I don’t know.
The problem is so complex that finding an effective solution will take considerable expertise in a variety of social science specialties. All I can say for sure is that the solution isn't as simple as people want it to be. To take a joke out of a certain movie/book, I don't know what the answer to "life, the universe, and everything" is, but I'm pretty sure the answer is not 42.

I don't pretend to have the answers; I just want to shift the conversation in the right direction because I think too many people want a quick-fix solution that even an untrained monkey can wrap his head around. The problem with thinking you know the answer is that you stop looking for the solution.

It's largely a parenting problem--most of these killers come from broken homes and abusive childhoods. But then, it becomes a poverty thing, right? And then you have to look at mental illness, since most of these shooters are on anti-depressants and such. And then you have to look at how they choose their targets. AND THEN at the very tippy top of the pyramid, you have the tools of destruction, the guns. The symptom of the disease. Taking guns away from killers without understanding their inclination to kill is like suppressing your cough and thinking you cured the common cold.

 

[LockardTheGOAT]

What a crackpot theory.

 

[Scrody]

I dont think its that simple. When most (not sure most, but a lot ) people are willing to shoot a kid stealing a iPod out of your car in the driveway, you cant blame that mindset on the internet. You are right about not giving a shit about each other, but its not the internet that caused that mindset.

Yeah you can. Without that iPod you can't get on the internet, plus they're kind of expensive. It directly affects the little world people have themselves in. I'm not saying society would be perfect without it, but we're just seeing the opening phases of how societies can be affected via the internet. Maybe I'm just all doom and gloom, but we are talking about a mass shooting where multiple people saw the warning signs a mile away, even authorities, yet did nothing.

 

[JonesBones]

They're the result of a political party who refuses any and all gun regulations, and the NRA. That is who it's on.

And the problem with Islam is bombs.

 

[Phelly2]

I agree it's a huge task, but the size of the task shouldn't stop people from trying. I don't believe that a gun ban is what is really being proposed but rather some basic sanctions and safeties put in place such as:
1) don't give guns to the criminally insane
2) don't give guns to people who have past violent criminal histories
3) don't give guns to people on terrorist watch lists

Everyone agrees with #1, but the problem is that the laws aren't very well enforced. Apparently, the FBI was warned about the latest shooter and they did little or nothing about it.
Everyone agrees with #2 and in fact, that's currently the law. As a law enforcement officer, though, I can tell you that I encounter violent felons with guns all the time and it's extremely difficult to prosecute them. Best I can do, in most cases, is take their gun away. And in some cases, they just claim "oh that's not mine that's my brother's" or whatever, so I have to give it to their brother, who almost certainly gives it back to the piece of trash I arrested. Something's wrong with that right there.

But that brings me to a point: If we can't even enforce the laws we have NOW, how are more laws going to fix the problem?

#3 is a bit more iffy, because our terrorist watch lists aren't based on anything concrete. I mean you might visit some other country, and they suspect you for some unknown reason that they don't have to explain, and they put a possible terrorist alert on you. That gets shared with the US, and bam, you're on the terrorist watch list. I've seen some real shady MF'ers on the terrorist watch list (with some jihadist shit written in their notebooks) and I have to set them loose, like have fun blowing up Americans. And then I've seen random joes on the watch list for no conceivable reason that I could discern.

As for Assault Rifles I think they are just the low hanging fruit. I don't want to get into the technicalities of definitions but we all broadly know what kind of things they are talking about, and those semantics are just to try and dissuade real conversation. Assault Rifles are low hanging fruit because they are surely not for self defence and they have the capacity to kill the most amount of people in the least amount of time. They are a weapon of warfare, not self defence.

I can't imagine there will be any significant success for at least a generation, the whole culture of guns is far too much to be realistically changed quickly. In addition the slow changes to gun ownership will take a long time to filter through as there are huge stockpiles out there and some narrow minded people will point out the next gun tragedy as if the system doesn't work. Fuck those people, they have a small mind and an unhealthy agenda.

This is a uniquely American problem and the hard questions have to be asked. A uniquely American love is for the gun...

Fair enough. We have a gun culture, but that stems back to the 1700's as far as I know.

 

[LockardTheGOAT]

Yeah you can. Without that iPod you can't get on the internet, plus they're kind of expensive. It directly affects the little world people have themselves in. I'm not saying society would be perfect without it, but we're just seeing the opening phases of how societies can be affected via the internet. Maybe I'm just all doom and gloom, but we are talking about a mass shooting where multiple people saw the warning signs a mile away, even authorities, yet did nothing.

Probably because a loner talking about guns isn't automatically portent that a mass shooting is about to take place.

 

[DespicablePeep]

Probably because a loner talking about guns isn't automatically portent that a mass shooting is about to take place.

Most school attacks are loners right?

I get that its difficult to stop prior to crimes but this kid had:

- Instagram with dead animals
- Youtube post saying he wanted to be a professional school shooter
- Kicked out of school

 

[smellmyfarts]

Just so we're clear, what kind of connection are you making to movies vs gun deaths? I mean, I have always thought that if we're gonna be going after gun manufacturers for supposedly making money off of shootings, we should have the ethical consistency for doing it for these movies. If the gun makers are fair game, so is the movie industry which has made ungodly amounts of money promoting gratuitous violence. That said, how much do you think these kinds of movies or the cop shows, i.e. Burn Notice, NCIS, Law and Order, Criminal Minds, NYPD Blue or Pulp Fiction type of movies are contributing to this gun violence?

The connection I am making is that the first generation to grow up on extreme movie violence was the first generation to start taking part in in these high profile mass school shootings. They happened before but not like they have since about the late 90's. Shootings in general are way down as is crime.

I think violent television or gaming only contributes to gun violence with a very very small amount of people just like the guns themselves or psyche meds. I think it's one of those things were multiple factor contribute to these kids snapping. It's our society in general. I don't think you can just point your finger and say "that's the problem."

 

[Scrody]

Probably because a loner talking about guns isn't automatically portent that a mass shooting is about to take place.

This kid had all of the telltale warning signs.

 

[Mark Cutting]

It's because of digital. A lot of people will do anything to get attention no matter the cost. A lot of kids first thoughts during the shooting was to pull out their phones and take videos for subscribers. In a way this can be attributed to capitalism, since attention often times equals money, although there are many different countries where you can use social media. I think for many kids, they see the glamour being sold on Instagram and think that if you don't have that kind of attention, you're a failure.

Impulsive cretins

 

[Mark Cutting]

This kid had all of the telltale warning signs.

Exactly. Plenty of red flags were just ignored.

 

[Jack Reacheround]

In that sense, capitalism would have to be partly to blame for everything that goes wrong, so no. Most of the blame can be broken down into two causal factors IMO.

1. Mental health issues not being disgnosed and treated properly.

2. No common sense gun regulation that would at least cut down on the sheer number of these incidents.

 

[helltoupee]

Lose what? You act like people in the armed forces would annihilate their own people like ants. These aren't t1000s my guy...

Studies have proven that people will follow almost any orders if given by an authority figure. The military is specifically indoctrinated not to question orders for a reason. Look at Nazi Germany - most those guys were committing inhumane crimes, not because they were robots, but because they were simply following orders.

And it's not like orders to kill Americans would be that blatant. They would be labeled as traitors or similar and rounded up.

 

[JonesBones]

It's because of digital. A lot of people will do anything to get attention no matter the cost. A lot of kids first thoughts during the shooting was to pull out their phones and take videos for subscribers. In a way this can be attributed to capitalism, since attention often times equals money, although there are many different countries where you can use social media. I think for many kids, they see the glamour being sold on Instagram and think that if you don't have that kind of attention, you're a failure.

It is a fuckin meme. If you take could take all people on earth and erase the idea of shooting up a school and people still had their guns, shootings wouldnt happen. It is totally an idea. One that spreads. The media too. They love this shit. Young Guns. Before he shot somebody Billy the kid said, "I'll make ya famous." Meaning you will get fame just by being killed by him. The media is saying the same thing to the country. I'll make ya famous. It is the only way pathetic losers can put a dent in this world.

Like when Keats died. He was writ in water. Nobody would remember him. These guys are trying not to be like Keats. This is his epitaph:

This grave contains all that was Mortal of a Young English Poet Who on his Death Bed, in the Bitterness of his Heart at the Malicious Power of his Enemies Desired these Words to be engraven on his Tomb Stone: Here lies One Whose Name was writ in Water. 24 February 1821.

• 
  As you are living, all your better deeds
  Shall be in water writ, but this in Marble:
  No Chronicle shall speak you, though your own,
  But for the shame of men.

 

[JSnake]