Shootings at Virginia Tech

[Paul Wolfe]

It is sad to hear the news of what happened at Viginia Tech this morning. Why someone would walk into a school of any sort and kill 22 people is beyond me. Why anyone would kill any human being is beyond me.

My heart and prayers go out to everyone involved.

[Sarab]

So sad. Reminds me of Columbine. 8 years as of April 20.
So many opportunities out there for people to get help, but yet, they choose violence. Scares me to death, with 2 young kids still in school.

[RR-ElectricAngel]

I believe the reason (as described by the media) was racism. I'm sure there is more to it than that. Hatred is learned rather than inborn. What I can't understand is how on earth so many people didn't have a chance to defend themselves. Why didn't anyone try to do anything? Did they just lay down while someone with a handgun gunned them down one at a time? That just breaks my heart...

[The Flying Dutchman]

Everybody over there is allowed to get a gun..........

[Paul Wolfe]

Everybody over there is allowed to get a gun..........

You need to be 21 to buy a handgun, but young teens are allowed to own rifles. That is one of the big issues with the gun control lobby in this country, that obtaining a gun is not too difficult.

It is also the pat answer every time there is a shooting - anyone can get a gun, if the control on guns was tighter than the shootings would be fewer... Without getting into a huge debate on the subject, all I can say is that the mentality and reasoning a shooter has isn't one of, "Boy, it's easy to buy a gun in the U.S. so I think I'll go shoot people today." There are underlying mental and emotional issues that lead to using the gun as a solution.

Dutch, I don't mean to say that you were suggesting that with your comment, I was just expunding on thoughts in my head (I've got the news going in the background as I type).




I want to point out that I think it is respectable that the Iranian government has expressed sympathy for the United States as a whole following yesterday's shooting. With all the differences we've had withthem as of late, it is nice to see that they can put aside the differences to show respect for this tragedy. It would be very easy for them to use this as a way to condemn our way of life but they have shown respect.

[Trigger]

Over here in Britain Guns are a no no, we dont have them and I am very pleased we don't. We do have shootings that are almost always gang related and if you hear of shootings you know the gun was ilegal.
I remember 11 years ago in Dunblane a man who had a legaly help gun went on a rampage in a under 10's school in Scotland. he got into where the under 5's were having an exercise class and shot almost all of them dead including the teacher, the children had tried to hide behind her and underneith her skirt. I still find the Dunblain shooting upsetting and as I write this I am getting tears in my eyes thinking about it.

[skezza]

Guns are not totally a no no in England, but you have to go down the right channels to obtain one, legally. Me and my father go to a target rifle shooting club as many fridays as possible and own between us a number of air rifles, rimmers and shotguns. My father is in the TA and was mobilized to Iraq in 2002. I have always taken an interest in my fathers work (most youngsters naturally do that), however that doesnt mean I think today I am going to run in and kill as many people as I can. I agree with Rocky, you there has to be a mental issue with whoever does such a terrible act.

[Paul Wolfe]

After watching the news yesterday, I understand the reasoning behind what this man did. I think his actions were horribly wrong, but I do get it - to an extent.

He mentioned Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold in a positive manner - as martyrs. They were the kids at Columbine High School in Colorado. What is often forgotten is that those boys felt they had been mistreated by the "cool" kids for years. Picked on and bullied and generally treated badly by peers. As a result, they retaliated by killing those they felt had wronged them. There are reports that they pointed their guns at some kids, stopped and said, "No, you're okay," and moved on to shoot others.

On Monday, Cho Seung Hui felt so much that he'd been treated this way that not only did he go on a shooting rampage, but he took the time to give a written and video explanation. The news media immediately jumped on this as "proof" that he was insane. I feel they missed the point.

Last night I had a long talk with my son who feels that he has been treated badly and picked on by peers for all of his six years of school. He is dealing with very real depression about this. He feels that there is something wrong with him because kids don't want to be his friend - at least not the kids he wants to be friends with. He wants to be popular, but it's not happening right away and some of the "cool" kids can be downright mean. It is a very real situation for kids all over the world.

Unfortunately, our society allows garbage like video games that glorify killing and music that glorifies violence to be fed to children. Too many adults are too busy chasing the almighty dollar, or Euro, or Yen to have time to be with their kids. So they buy video games to entertain them, or simply leave their kids to their own devices. Then they are "shocked" when something goes wrong. I am not saying the games or music cause the behavior, simply that they contribute to seeing violence as an acceptable solution.

Cho Seung Hui had at least two roommates at Virginia Tech who where on television yesterday. Both of them said he never spoke - in nine months! They were both suprised to find out he was the shooter because he seemed so shy and quiet. If I lived with someone for 9 months, I would have found a way to speak to him - and they claim they did, but after the fact of course they'll say that. He felt mistreated by his peers, I would feel that way, too if I lived with people for 9 months and they didn't talk to me.

The news media has a way of following the leads that support their hypothesis. So the chance that they will interview anyone on air that knew Cho Seung Hui in a positive sense is highly unlikely. I am sure they will also not follow up on the root of the problem which is the way the "cliques" of childhood can damage the psyches of those who are near the edge. I also find it interesting that this young man lived in the United States during his high school years but I've heard no mention of his family - other than that they are Korean.

Enough of my rant, this kind of thing just touches a nerve in me.

[Paul Wolfe]

This is sad. Now there have been a number of threats to "outdo" the massacre on Monday.

These threats come from people who seem to want to be immortalized in history by committing heinous crimes. These people are truly mentally ill in my opinion. A desire to willingly end the lives of many just to make a name for oneself?

Some people have actually attempted follow through.

I believe that every person in our society needs to take this week as a wake up call and become much more vigilant in regards to how we treat people.

[GUITARIDOL5682]

Guns are easily obtained these days without the need to own them legally.Deactivated weapons can easily be reactivated and the gangland under world are living proof of doing this and profitting from it aswell.But you take someone who is mentally ill and tool him up to the hilt with the latest in automatic weapons.Then he goes and visits some large shopping mall on a Saturday afternoon.It's going to get you in the publics eye and you are going to be instantly remembered plus its going to be the best Live video game that killers ever going to play.Society in general has a lot to answer for and not recognising people who are badly 4orked up in the head.One prime example was the two very young boys who murdered/killed the toddler Jamie Bulgher.What was going through those kid's minds when they done that, it was totally sick..What do people say afterwards" Oh! i blame the parents ???" well who do you point the finger too.When the innocent victims are left grieving who is to blame...

[Paul Wolfe]

What do people say afterwards" Oh! i blame the parents ???"

And very often that is exactly who could have stopped the problems at an early age.

[Paul Wolfe]

WACO, Texas (CNN) -- Zero tolerance, huh? Gun-free zones, huh? Try this on for size: Columbine gun-free zone, New York City pizza shop gun-free zone, Luby's Cafeteria gun-free zone, Amish school in Pennsylvania gun-free zone and now Virginia Tech gun-free zone.

Anybody see what the evil Brady Campaign and other anti-gun cults have created? I personally have zero tolerance for evil and denial. And America had best wake up real fast that the brain-dead celebration of unarmed helplessness will get you killed every time, and I've about had enough of it.

Nearly a decade ago, a Springfield, Oregon, high schooler, a hunter familiar with firearms, was able to bring an unfolding rampage to an abrupt end when he identified a gunman attempting to reload his .22-caliber rifle, made the tactical decision to make a move and tackled the shooter.

A few years back, an assistant principal at Pearl High School in Mississippi, which was a gun-free zone, retrieved his legally owned Colt .45 from his car and stopped a Columbine wannabe from continuing his massacre at another school after he had killed two and wounded more at Pearl.

At an eighth-grade school dance in Pennsylvania, a boy fatally shot a teacher and wounded two students before the owner of the dance hall brought the killing to a halt with his own gun.

More recently, just a few miles up the road from Virginia Tech, two law school students ran to fetch their legally owned firearm to stop a madman from slaughtering anybody and everybody he pleased. These brave, average, armed citizens neutralized him pronto.

My hero, Dr. Suzanne Gratia Hupp, was not allowed by Texas law to carry her handgun into Luby's Cafeteria that fateful day in 1991, when due to bureaucrat-forced unarmed helplessness she could do nothing to stop satanic George Hennard from killing 23 people and wounding more than 20 others before he shot himself. Hupp was unarmed for no other reason than denial-ridden "feel good" politics.

She has since led the charge for concealed weapon upgrade in Texas, where we can now stop evil. Yet, there are still the mindless puppets of the Brady Campaign and other anti-gun organizations insisting on continuing the gun-free zone insanity by which innocents are forced into unarmed helplessness. Shame on them. Shame on America. Shame on the anti-gunners all.

No one was foolish enough to debate Ryder truck regulations or ammonia nitrate restrictions or a "cult of agriculture fertilizer" following the unabashed evil of Timothy McVeigh's heinous crime against America on that fateful day in Oklahoma City. No one faulted kitchen utensils or other hardware of choice after Jeffrey Dahmer was caught drugging, mutilating, raping, murdering and cannibalizing his victims. Nobody wanted "steak knife control" as they autopsied the dead nurses in Chicago, Illinois, as Richard Speck went on trial for mass murder.

Evil is as evil does, and laws disarming guaranteed victims make evil people very, very happy. Shame on us.

Already spineless gun control advocates are squawking like chickens with their tiny-brained heads chopped off, making political hay over this most recent, devastating Virginia Tech massacre, when in fact it is their own forced gun-free zone policy that enabled the unchallenged methodical murder of 32 people.

Thirty-two people dead on a U.S. college campus pursuing their American Dream, mowed-down over an extended period of time by a lone, non-American gunman in illegal possession of a firearm on campus in defiance of a zero-tolerance gun law. Feel better yet? Didn't think so.

Who doesn't get this? Who has the audacity to demand unarmed helplessness? Who likes dead good guys?

I'll tell you who. People who tramp on the Second Amendment, that's who. People who refuse to accept the self-evident truth that free people have the God-given right to keep and bear arms, to defend themselves and their loved ones. People who are so desperate in their drive to control others, so mindless in their denial that they pretend access to gas causes arson, Ryder trucks and fertilizer cause terrorism, water causes drowning, forks and spoons cause obesity, dialing 911 will somehow save your life, and that their greedy clamoring to "feel good" is more important than admitting that armed citizens are much better equipped to stop evil than unarmed, helpless ones.

Pray for the families of victims everywhere, America. Study the methodology of evil. It has a profile, a system, a preferred environment where victims cannot fight back. Embrace the facts, demand upgrade and be certain that your children's school has a better plan than Virginia Tech or Columbine. Eliminate the insanity of gun-free zones, which will never, ever be gun-free zones. They will only be good guy gun-free zones, and that is a recipe for disaster written in blood on the altar of denial. I, for one, refuse to genuflect there.

[Zakk Daniels]

I work for a firearms distributor, and this sickens me. My industry, firearms retailing and distribution will surely take a hit from this incident. I feel so bad for the families of the victims. I work with guns all day and I do not even like them, but it pays the bills. It is scary how a person could just snap like that and do all that devastation to human life. I pray for the victims and their families and friends.

[Stiltzkin]

came across one pro-gun-nut who posted this ...