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So, are gun related massacres part of American culture?

Jim Mac

MAKE ENDURO GREAT AGAIN
May 21, 2004
6,352
282
the middle east of NY
While I have been know to have fun firing off an AK 47 here and there (usually when my Dutch pals come over to visit), I am now truly wondering - are gun related massacres now part of our culture? Do disaffected people feel this is an OK way to express themselves? Extreme Seasonal Affective Disorder?

I mean, Richard Poplawski in a bullet-proof vest guns down three policemen in Pittsburgh. Jiverly Wong shoots 14 to death in Binghamton, New York. Robert Stewart kills eight at a nursing home in North Carolina. Devan Kalathat, five in Santa Clara, California. Cop-killer Lovelle Mixon, four in Oakland. Michael McLendon, ten across two rural counties in Alabama. All these (43 altogether) happened over the last 26 days.

I had an experience 2 weeks ago - a coworker of mine (a manager I supervise) said, "Oh I just got a text message from Chris _____. He says he is in the area and is coming to visit us at our team meeting".
I said to her, "But... I fired him, doesn't he know he can't come in the building?" Before I could get those words out, he was here - visiting us, in a room with filled with staff and him blocking the exit. I was seriously sweating and thinking about the "What if's" of a guy who I fired coming back to "visit". Luckily it was OK, but I really found myself doing some quick 'exit strategy' planning.

What's your take on this? Is this part of the new US culture?
 

MMike

A fowl peckerwood.
Sep 5, 2001
18,207
105
just sittin' here drinkin' scotch
Gun related massacres are your right as an american....protected by your constitution....or one of the amendments thereto.

edit: regarding your personal anecdote, if you (or the rest of your co-workers) had been carrying, you would have been able to easily "neutralize the threat"...more proof that everyone should have a sidearm at all times.
 
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sanjuro

Tube Smuggler
Sep 13, 2004
17,373
0
SF
I don't think it is the access to guns necessarily. In Switzerland, most citizens have a high quality assault rifle issued to them by the military.

However, we live in a culture of gun violence. Turn on the tv, and you will likely see a shooting on tv. You will never see a bare breast, but guns ablazing, yes.
 

MikeD

Leader and Demogogue of the Ridemonkey Satinists
Oct 26, 2001
11,669
1,713
chez moi
I've said it many times, but I think our culture's treatment of violence is at the heart of why this stuff happens (both here and abroad--it's spreading).

We, as a society, like to pretend that violence and violent thought is un-natural and weird, not a natural and normal human response. We freak out if kids get in fights at school and are currently eliminating many competitive sports, especially the more violent ones, from phys-ed curricula or are eliminating physical activity altogether.

We simultaneously live in a society that insulates us, by and large, from violence and thus prevents us from seeing the real results/cost of it. (Especially middle-class America, which seems to breed this random, anonymous violence; inner-city kids may see the results of shootings and other violence, but they're part of other criminal activity, not deliberate acts of nihilism for their own sakes.) We don't generally see death of any kind firsthand--meat shows up inanimate and pre-packaged, the sick and dying are isolated in hospitals instead of dying at home.

So violence and the tools of violence are alienated from our culture and have in some perverse way become the license and hallmark of the disaffected. There's a terrible cultural pattern developing that I can't say how to stop.
 

manimal

Ociffer Tackleberry
Feb 27, 2002
7,212
17
Blindly running into cactus
well said miked. in addition, the prominence of murder simulator video games and violent "shoot em up" style hollywood films only helps to further inoculate an entire generation to the process of killing without the negative side effects found in those who have actually killed.
something is wrong with our society when we can't spank our kids in public for fear of it being called abuse yet it is socially acceptable to plop a child down in front a computer to play a video game that rewards the player for violent and criminal activities.
Pavlov could figure it out, why haven't we?
 

Silver

find me a tampon
Jul 20, 2002
10,840
1
Orange County, CA
Look at the stats. Are we actually more violent than we were before video games and violent movies?

But hey, blame Hollywood, instead of blaming a political class that sees nothing wrong with invading other countries and killing their citizens as long as it furthers American geopolitical or financial interests. It's all the movies...
 

sanjuro

Tube Smuggler
Sep 13, 2004
17,373
0
SF
Look at the stats. Are we actually more violent than we were before video games and violent movies?

But hey, blame Hollywood, instead of blaming a political class that sees nothing wrong with invading other countries and killing their citizens as long as it furthers American geopolitical or financial interests. It's all the movies...
Well, changing TV, film, and video games is easier than changing people.

Make acts of gun violence X-rated.
 

jimmydean

The Official Meat of Ridemonkey
Sep 10, 2001
40,941
13,134
Portland, OR
Look at the stats. Are we actually more violent than we were before video games and violent movies?

But hey, blame Hollywood, instead of blaming a political class that sees nothing wrong with invading other countries and killing their citizens as long as it furthers American geopolitical or financial interests. It's all the movies...
So you are saying we SHOULDN'T have invaded Iraq?

"The man tried to kill my father!" - Black Bush
 

Silver

find me a tampon
Jul 20, 2002
10,840
1
Orange County, CA
So you are saying we SHOULDN'T have invaded Iraq?

"The man tried to kill my father!" - Black Bush
It goes much further back than that. Right to the time that the Pilgrims realized that the Indians were more lucrative if they were mostly dead. It is certainly not an exclusively American phenomenon. We just make it easier for the psychos to get guns.
 

manimal

Ociffer Tackleberry
Feb 27, 2002
7,212
17
Blindly running into cactus
i disagree silver and i will revisit this when i have time to transcribe some very enlightening research on the topic from the book On Killing by Dave Grossman. (currently heading upstairs to put the kids to bed ;) )
i HIGHLY recommend this book to logicial thinkers like yourself, it is full of facts and comparisons that show the direct link between violence innoculation and an increased rate of physical violence.
you are partly correct, however, in that our current condition stems from the military. a paradigm shift in training occurred after WWII when the military realized that there was an extreme lack of participation by more than 80% of servicemembers in regards to actually engaging the enemy. the human reluctance to kill was so strong that only 20% directly fired at the enemy, sometimes even if killing meant savign their own life.
military basic training has had a dramatic shift in focus since then by use of murder simulation: firing at human shaped targets instead of bullseye, dehumanizing the enemy, downplay of the terms that relate to killing (the book expounds much more than my tiny brain could ever remember to type here but i think you get the point.)
that violence innoculation has now transferred over to the mass media allowing a nation as a whole to be less disgusted with violence, particularly with guns.

ok...i've carried on far too long and the kids are running around like crazies...gotta go put 'em in bed. i'll try to make more sense of this tomorrow.
 

sanjuro

Tube Smuggler
Sep 13, 2004
17,373
0
SF
i disagree silver and i will revisit this when i have time to transcribe some very enlightening research on the topic from the book On Killing by Dave Grossman. (currently heading upstairs to put the kids to bed ;) )
i HIGHLY recommend this book to logicial thinkers like yourself, it is full of facts and comparisons that show the direct link between violence innoculation and an increased rate of physical violence.
you are partly correct, however, in that our current condition stems from the military. a paradigm shift in training occurred after WWII when the military realized that there was an extreme lack of participation by more than 80% of servicemembers in regards to actually engaging the enemy. the human reluctance to kill was so strong that only 20% directly fired at the enemy, sometimes even if killing meant savign their own life.
military basic training has had a dramatic shift in focus since then by use of murder simulation: firing at human shaped targets instead of bullseye, dehumanizing the enemy, downplay of the terms that relate to killing (the book expounds much more than my tiny brain could ever remember to type here but i think you get the point.)
that violence innoculation has now transferred over to the mass media allowing a nation as a whole to be less disgusted with violence, particularly with guns.

ok...i've carried on far too long and the kids are running around like crazies...gotta go put 'em in bed. i'll try to make more sense of this tomorrow.
Grossman sounds like some kind of peacenik hippie:

Col. Grossman is a West Point psychology professor, Professor of Military Science, and an Army Ranger who has combined his experiences to become the founder of a new field of scientific endeavor, which has been termed “killology.” In this new field Col. Grossman has made revolutionary new contributions to our understanding of killing in war, the psychological costs of war, the root causes of the current "virus" of violent crime that is raging around the world, and the process of healing the victims of violence, in war and peace.
Looks like one too. I though I saw him on the corner of Telegraph and Ashby last week:

 

Silver

find me a tampon
Jul 20, 2002
10,840
1
Orange County, CA
i disagree silver and i will revisit this when i have time to transcribe some very enlightening research on the topic from the book On Killing by Dave Grossman. (currently heading upstairs to put the kids to bed ;) )
i HIGHLY recommend this book to logicial thinkers like yourself, it is full of facts and comparisons that show the direct link between violence innoculation and an increased rate of physical violence.
you are partly correct, however, in that our current condition stems from the military. a paradigm shift in training occurred after WWII when the military realized that there was an extreme lack of participation by more than 80% of servicemembers in regards to actually engaging the enemy. the human reluctance to kill was so strong that only 20% directly fired at the enemy, sometimes even if killing meant savign their own life.
military basic training has had a dramatic shift in focus since then by use of murder simulation: firing at human shaped targets instead of bullseye, dehumanizing the enemy, downplay of the terms that relate to killing (the book expounds much more than my tiny brain could ever remember to type here but i think you get the point.)
that violence innoculation has now transferred over to the mass media allowing a nation as a whole to be less disgusted with violence, particularly with guns.

ok...i've carried on far too long and the kids are running around like crazies...gotta go put 'em in bed. i'll try to make more sense of this tomorrow.
Actually, I wasn't even blaming the military. I was blaming their civilian masters.

What are the stats on ex-military committing murder? I really don't know. I also don't know that we are more violent than we used to be, per capita.

I do know that if videogames were the culprit, we should have seen a huge surge in crime stats of people who are currently between 25-35 years old. I'd imagine that would be a pretty easy variable to isolate for.
 

MikeD

Leader and Demogogue of the Ridemonkey Satinists
Oct 26, 2001
11,669
1,713
chez moi
Yeah, I think blaming video games or whatever is a little bit of an easy out. Kids used to play more physically and act out violence ("playing Army," remember that one??) and it wasn't linked to this kind of thing. (Then again, playing army never resulted in the visual blood-splatter of a good melee attack in HALO 3...)

People also used to be able to order tommy guns in the mail, so I don't think we can blame guns, either. And blaming Bush (a la Michael Moore) is also a bit of a projection. As Silver so rightly points out, Americans have been committing acts of armed violence since the beginning, but we haven't had school shootings starting in 1492. (Although I'd disagree with his blase assessment of the Pilgrims' motives...it was a sad story all around, frankly. "Mayflower" is a fairly recent book with a good account of settlement through King Philip's War and it's pretty depressing to read about the stupidity on all sides...)
 

valve bouncer

Master Dildoist
Feb 11, 2002
7,843
114
Japan
Whatever you do America, don't try and actually reduce the number of guns you have. That would be quitting. Do you want to be a nation of poofs? High heels and nail varnish? Tucking your scrotum?