I'm sure many of you heard about this at some point yesterday. Some new details have been revealed about the Gunman and his supposed motive for going on a gun rampage in a local Nebraska Mall which resulted in the death of 8 people and also himself: Taken from BBC News This guy evidently had mental problems. I just hope that the supreme court carefully consider whether to revise the gun laws in America and ultimately change them before more tragedies like this can happen.
Now that's just not true... *looks for gun to get revenge* ...oh wait, shit! Seriously, though, guns and drugs are far too easy to get in this country. I have my beliefs as to why that will never change, but I don't feel like going into a political-rant at the moment. This is an extremely sad story, though. It's even worse that he did it just to become famous... what a fucking asshole.
I'm sorry but I'm not going to allow you to bring my country into this bullshit, and throw the blame for this event on us. Why? Because your statement is incorrect. There was a college shooting in Canada or another country only a year ago, where some gothic kid came in and randomly started shooting people, so FYI: we are not the only country that has this type of violence. Your statement set me off because I've had it with the America bashing I see all over the internet. Let me clear something up for you: THE UNITED STATES IS A GREAT COUNTRY, its the idiot we have for president and these attention seeking emo kids with guys that are the real issue in this country. The fact is our gun laws are too lax, but then Bush isn't doing anything about it (even after Virginia Tech) so once again...you can blame that on our lovely president, and not the country itself. In all honestly I can't wait till we get a new president in office (preferably Barack Obama) so we can regain our standing in the world and this unwarranted hatred against us can stop. Remember its not America that's the problem, its Bush. As much as I utterly despise the Clinton's we were doing just fine before Bush came in to office.
There was also a school shooting in Finland this year, so it definitely isn't an American only thing. I've just learned to live with the American hate and not let it get to me. Despite the fact that judging an entire country of 300 million people on the actions of their government (and a small percentage of low-lifes who always attract the headlines) is extremely ignorant and borderline prejudice... I've learned to cope.
It just goes to show how a leader of a country can influence people's opinion on that particular country by their actions. People think North Korea is a violent place, but my friend in the military was stationed there for a year and said the media's representation of it is way off.
The mall where this shooting occurred is 10 minutes away from me, I was just there last week. The city is completely shocked, and I'm still in disgust that a person who is disgraceful enough to take his own life would take it to an even lower level to think he could choose to cut short the lives of random people. I'm to the point where I don't even trust anyone in public anymore. It's a pathetic mindset, but you really never know.
"Well, then there are too countries where it can happen...?" No. That's just a stupid statement. Ok, it happens in America, but there's violence every where. Just earlier this week a couple of people got stabbed at a children's party for Sinterklaas over here... I mean, what the hell? Changing the gun law would be one thing, but that won't be the end of it. It'll be an endless struggle to get rid of all the violence in the world, but as long as there are people actually taking action there's a change it'll happen right? You can't blame anyone for this besides the kid who obviously had mental problems.
I'm not gonna bash America for this but I will and always will heavily criticise the American gun laws until they're changed. I say this simply because while incidents like this have happened in various countries around the world, the number of Gun crimes in America is absolutely absurd. Time and time again there's mass media coverage of incidents such as this in America and time and time again there are calls for Gun laws to be changed however nothing is ever done. Perhaps it's high time that the US government stop medelling in other countrie's affairs and focus on their own problems because too many innocent people are being killed in cases such as this.
There's a quote from Marilyn Manson about this when he was interviewed by Bill O'Reilly. "I think that [kids misinterpreting lyrics] is a very valid point, and I think that that's a reflection of not necessarily this program but of television in general. If you die and enough people are watching, you become a martyr. You become a hero, you become well known. So when you have things like Columbine and you have these kids that are angry and they have something to say and no one's listening, the media sends a message that if you do something loud enough, and it gets our attention, then you will be famous for it. Those kids ended up on the cover of Time magazine, and the media gave them exactly what they wanted. That's why I never did any interviews when that happened when I was getting blamed for it, I thought I would be contributing to what I thought would be reprehensible." Yet again, it happened. Look at how 4chan /b/ board started the "an hero" drama with that kid that killed himself over losing an iPod. We give people fame who don't deserve it, and then people wonder why there are copycat crimes in the world. Control guns, talk to your children, and vote for someone who is going to turn the country in a different direction. I not only blame the people doing the shooting, but the family for not doing anything about their emotional or mental issues sooner.
The "pro-gun/NRA" lobby in this country disgusts me. On another forum I frequent, there's one member who is extremely pro-gun and anti-gun control, naturally. EVERY TIME an event like this happens, he has to post a thread saying how gun control doesn't work and how we need more guns, and he politicizes tragedies like this. He did it after the shooting in the Salt Lake City mall. He did it after Virginia Tech. He did it after this Omaha shooting. Every god damn time something like this happens, he makes a political statement. He claims that this was able to happen simply because the mall in Omaha (and SLC and VT) chose to disallow concealed weapons and he pushes his NRA bullshit. Right, so you think we can solve the problem of massacres with MORE GUNS? FUCKING IDIOT. Not to mention that I'm sure this all happened within a matter of seconds, and by the time someone with a concealed weapon figured out what the hell was going on, we already would've had 9 people dead. While this does happen in other countries, and I'm not going to say "only in America" or anything like that, these events are due to problems in America. The pro gun lobby has enough power to prevent the government from passing the needed legislation to keep us safe, and we continue to vote for people who don't have enough balls to stand up to the pro gun lobby and actually pass some decent gun control laws. I realize that gun control laws will not stop large groups, such as organized crime and gangs from getting guns. They can't easily be stopped. But if we ban guns, we will stop the student who gets bullied one too many times and wants to shoot up the school, and we will stop the depressed guy who wants to be famous. We'll also stop the guy who comes home from work early and finds his wife fucking someone else and gets mad, we'll stop the person who shoots their spouse for life insurance money, we'll stop the robber who shoots the convenience store employee and we'll stop the drunk guys who take a bar fight too far. And these criminals probably cause more deaths than all of the organized crime and gangs combined.
It happens alot in the USA and thats why I think its a bull country. Bush is the one who's making America what it is today. I dont hate America, dont get me wrong but I wouldnt want to live there.
QFT. I know a guy who went completely ape-shit years ago when Clinton enacted a ban on the sale of automatic weapons. I can understand wanting to protect yourself (anybody who lives in a bad neighborhood can attest to that), but do you really need a fucking AK-47 to do it? There's too much money and corporate interest involved in American politics for anything to get done. Couple that with the aforementioned spineless politicians, who are more concerned with raising their annual salary then doing something that might help the American public, and then you have a clusterfuck.
And this is why Todd should be president, if not Barack Obama. Best post in these forums in a long time.
As much as that is a possibility, I refuse to believe that it can be as bad as it has been with Bush. As much as I despise Hillary, I think that even she could run this country better than Bush has. Bush has done nothing but to ruin our economy, allow our earth to go in peril, wage a needless war, and destroy our standing in the world. America has lost its respectable position in the world, and that is a sad thing folks.
Why do people constanly blame President Bush for every tragedy that happens? I mean, yes, he's the President and controls the laws, and is very widely unliked, but you can't blame a shooting by someone who isn't mentally sane, on the President! At all! This is purely, 100% the Hawkin kid's fault. Not President Bush's. And I know, it's because it's easy to get guns in this country, but even if there was a change in the law, people would still possess guns and there would still be these tragedies. But this really shouldn't be a discussion thread, feels a little un-caring. Anyway, I'm so sorry to hear about this, and I have all the affected families in my heart. And for the one's who died, rest in peace. <3