another "Columbine' thwarted

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http://www.cnn.com/2014/05/01/justice/m ... -thwarted/

is it me, or are these things accelerating?

What is making kids so angry? What is going on ?

You have to look at the music these people listen to and the kinds of diversions they use for "entertainment" and wonder how anyone cannot draw the conclusion there is not a connection. Just because not everyone who indulges in these activities is not a mass murderer does not mean they are not being affected negatively on an emotional level. I would not consciously live next to a young male that s always listening to music like that and playing video games like that. The background sounds or "music" in those games sounds like a bicycle chain/ball bearing cocktail having an orgy in a cuisinart. That stuff will scramble someones brain up worse than a 4 egg western omelet.

Its not you, these are accelerating

I play a lot of video games and I think many people with access to them really aren't remotely mature enough to deal with the subject matter. I think a lot of violent games, enthusiastically built as they may be, serve as military recruitment tools or just testosterone soaked self-validation mechanisms. A month ago in my favorite coffee shop I, among many others, witnessed some guy about 5-7 years my senior screaming unspeakable vulgarities on his cellphone down into his laptop. Nobody wanted to make a scene or see anyone injured, and it unfortunately fell outside the domain of the police, he wasn't directly harassing anyone, save for perhaps the person he was calling. No one could get any real clue to what was going on. It wasn't just the bystander effect, I sensed a lot of remorse in the room over what might've befallen him. I happen to know there exist types of videogames (and of course music) so violent they usually never see many sales, so I'm concerned there may be a highly isolated pocket of severe mental disturbance at work, perpetuating itself online. Some day I hope to build up the processing, search & data aggregation capability to make a dent in such horrible occurances.

I doubt it is the music. I remember my parents and others of that generation complaining about the possible effect of Black Sabbath, AC/DC, Iron Maiden etc on the mental health of young people. Violent computer games - dunno, possibly. I used to play Doom and run around for hours shooting monsters and enemy soldiers - the only effect such games had on me was to make my driving more erratic; it wasn't possible to immediately slow down from the adrenaline fuelled activity of game play to real life. But even with violent video games, this passed as the adrenaline levels regained normality.

I think something else is going on with these kids. Maybe they just feel excluded from society and face insurmountable psychological pressures to conform that push them to breaking point. When they break they go on a shooting rampage (perhaps in part because guns are so readily available in America). In China the kids go on a stabbing spree. In Japan the kids commit suicide. Many others just turn to alcohol or drug abuse or gang membership to try to get away from their painful lives. Sweeping generalisations I know, but kids worldwide go off the rails due to psychological pressure from their parents, peers, school etc. Maybe the nature of modern society is itself the cause of the problem.

I think people see kids gearing up to fight wars that were never slated to happen, often dismissing this as merely surly behavior, temporary hormonal imbalance or in right-wing circles, entirely normal. This isn't REMOTELY about Sabbath or shock rock, some metal is actively aligned with things like neofacism, white supremacy, military extremism, neonazi biker gangs, purely directionless rage and so on. Just the same for the videogames, some friends of mine ran across one in which the 1st person player-character must escape from an asylum in a thunderstorm, full of 'CIA' experiments gone gruesomely wrong, that's just the tip of the iceberg. All manner of cerebrally-aligned gore and depravity are wire-framed, textured, scripted and advertised, all so people like this can distort their sense of being.

Some games read like black comedies and stand out among the droves of mindlessly violent shoot-em-ups, unfortunately for every game with any artistic merit along come several hundred with the sole intention of being twisted.

Movies can be even worse. I would provide examples but I don't want to ruin anyone's peace & calm. I'm personally aware of and a fan of metal music advocating for the dismantling of war, greed and territorial instinct itself. More serious metal fans ad-hoc vendettas against those seeking to popularize the hateful subgenres, it's taken VERY seriously in that community. Darkness is seen as quite rigidly separate from the acknowledgement of darkness.

IMO it's the media hype surrounding school shootings that can be attributed to school shootings. It's a phenomena similar to suicide contagion.

The darkness and anger are already there. All these kids need then is for an idea or inspiration to be planted into their head. Much like a suicidal person; they already have the will to kill themselves but lack an idea on how.

Groups tend to want to socialise people either by instinct or by design, and it seems that within the U.S high school system the socialisation is carried out by extremely ignorant and xenophobic conservative types, and thugs who are out murdering people on weekends, causing high school socialisation to be prison level barbaric. A certain number of students who are unable to mould a persona to suit often impossible to meet peer group expectations, and who are brutally tormented every day as a result, are going to snap.

Another possible contributing factor is that certain prescribed medications for ADHD and the like, may bring about a loss of empathy or other side effects, making violent outbursts more likely.

Something is occurring in the U.S that isn't occurring elsewhere. An honest investigation would require a level of maturity, and critical self assessment that is not in abundant supply in the U.S mainstream. Has anyone considered that private security firms employed at these schools constitute a vested interest with a stake in prolonging the violent school culture (my question mark key is not working after I spilled some coffee). There must be other interests which benefit from these shootings aswell.

Last edited by Stannis on 03 May 2014, 2:21 pm, edited 2 times in total.

the story is full of holes
watch out for legislation's to get quickly pushed through in the next few days

Possibly, but this is what Alex Jones says after every school shooting. What's the evidence.

These stories are full of holes in direct correspondence to the psyches of the perpetrators.

Uh.....you kind of lost me in the part I bolded.
Murdering people on weekends???

Not enough leverage to do much legislatively. If he'd gotten to carry out his plan then they'd have some leverage.

On hand hand it seems almost surreal as if he'd be set up, but on the other hand there's all kinds of nuts that would actually carry out a mass murder plot like that.
It's an F'ed up world...

t's what the kids are doing these days. Didn't you ever see Class of 1984 or the Principal starring James Belushi.

Last edited by Stannis on 04 May 2014, 6:31 am, edited 1 time in total.