Gunman Kills Hostage, Self in Standoff

[CoffeeSaint]

No, this proves that teachers should be licensed to carry conceived weapons. A pistol in the teacher's purse or pocket would have stopped this event.


If the teacher would have been armed this wouldn't have happened.

Do you really believe that outlawing guns would take guns from the hands of criminals? That's just ludicrous.

Israel has an extremely low murder rate and almost everyone is heavily armed. Simply put, "More Guns Less Crime".

I'm a teacher. If you allowed teachers to go armed, I wouldn't. If you insisted that teachers go armed, I wouldn't fire. The hostage was killed after SWAT breached the room and fired on the gunman; what makes you think that an armed teacher could have put him down with no casualties, if SWAT couldn't do it?

I believe that outlawing guns might be the first step to removing them from everyone's hands, including those of criminals. More importantly, I believe that arguing for more guns as a solution to violent crime is absurd; this man was clearly not right in the head, and the possibility of dying would not have stopped him from committing this crime. You have a point when it comes to property crime, but in this cowboy nation of ours, more guns means more killings, not less. We already see guns as power, and the more we advocate them as a solution to our problems, the more power they gain in our eyes, and that power will not always be used to keep the peace.

This is insane, get those metal detectors out of every school so students are equally armed to protect themselves. One gun man walks into a classroom and says get in line, the 30 students draw their weapons and say...............not so much.

Right, and every other day, when the teacher says, "Pop quiz!" they all pull out their guns and say . . . not so much.
Or, on a less facetious note, every time a kid starts a fight, he can do it with lead instead of his fists. I had one of my students turn to another during class yesterday and say out loud, "Why don't you go f#ck your sister?" I have no doubt that those two kids got into a fistfight at some point later in the day, or if they haven't yet, they will; what are the chances that a situation like that could lead to gunplay, if every student was locked and loaded?

[rmnunez]

From what I gather the gunman was a pervert, maybe we should focus on that angle rather than on his use of a firearm.

[JohnMK]

Let's have your thoughts on that subject, if you don't mind, Sr. Núñez. Unless you're merely broaching the subject.

[rmnunez]

I think the pedophilia angle is fascinating, obviously it attracts attention in this case. The perpetrator was killed in the act. The practice is rare and seems to have ranges depending on gender and age. Generally found abominable in every sense, pedophilia seems of very limited incidence, it is not an "alternative life-style", nor some ethnic or age related trait.

[Scribbler1]

In other words, in a country of approximately 300,000,000 people there are 299,999,999 people walking around who did NOT hijack a schoolroom the other day and assault the students.

For the media to disseminate the information is fine. They did their jobs. To drag the crime out for days, weeks or even months in an effort to create a "cause", whether for gun control or against is a waste of time.

[rmnunez]

No, I think the media's focus on this sort of activity has something to do with a latent prurient interest in the public for details of this sort of behaviour.

[Scribbler1]

That's a given, but I was referring to the obvious and inevitable good gun/bad gun argument that always seems to follow these kinds of tragedies.

[rmnunez]

I'm unfamiliar with the "good gun/bad gun" argument, if it inevitably follows this should soon be resolved.

[CoffeeSaint]

I think the pedophilia angle is fascinating, obviously it attracts attention in this case. The perpetrator was killed in the act. The practice is rare and seems to have ranges depending on gender and age. Generally found abominable in every sense, pedophilia seems of very limited incidence, it is not an "alternative life-style", nor some ethnic or age related trait.

I'm not sure this would qualify as pedophilia, strictly speaking; these were young women more than little girls. The student who was killed was 17. The article I saw said that all 6 hostages who were kept in the room were harassed/molested in some way, and two were sexually assaulted. That being the case, I see this more as an extreme case of rape than a case of child molestation.

I would say that this indicates something dangerous in the way we sexualize young women in our society, but this is just such an extreme case: I don't believe the sexual/illicit allure of the young women was what made this man try to commit suicide in this public and violent way. It is possible, however, that all of the school assaults that have happened recently have made schools potential targets for psychos like this, just as work places have been in the past; he may have seen school as a place to get a large number of potential victims, and also a way to ensure media attention and a large and violent police response, which may have been what he was after all along. But since the man is dead, we will never know; he may have hated the school building, or believed the PA system was telling him to die for Satan. Who knows?

[rmnunez]

we sexualize young women in our society

Speak for yourself, I won't sexualize young women without a valid and unalterable driver's license.

[syracusa]

Speak for yourself, I won't sexualize young women without a valid and unalterable driver's license.

Interesting thread, like many others. But fruitless, like all the others.
Considering the experience I've acquired with dozens of threads on Volconvo throughout the years, I eventually realized that any debate concerning anything "social" on this forum has very little value as long as some sensitive individualist is always bound to rear his/her ugly head and dismiss any societal-level effects.
They will scream "bloody murder", "don't generalize", I don't do that, it doesn't apply to ME, it doesn't apply to everybody, speak for yourself , etc.

Sigbir Mnunez, it's not about YOU, or what YOU DO.

American society DOES sexualize very young women - bordering on children.

It sexualizes 3 year olds, not just 15 year olds!!!!
Have you checked out the clothes racks for little girls lately? How about the nasty beauty pagents for kids? How about little girls' spaghetti strap dresses, nail lacquer, sun glasses, make-up kits for little girls, high heels and all kinds of accesories that invite little girls to imitate a fully developed woman?


Give me a break with what YOU DO!

[rmnunez]

It was a play on words syracusa, I live in Mexico City and don't have any small kids or girls, don't check what's in the girls clothes racks at department stores. I know from more fortunate friends who often are also parents, that little girls love to play with makeup and get all dolled up, that's the way it is in Mexico and other places I've lived.

If the problem is some endemic societal tendency to sexualize young girls provocatively dressing them in high heels and putting them in beauty pageants, maybe united statians are collectively a bit sicker than I thought. Then again, it could be people like Foley represent the cutting edge of an emerging society which has come to terms with its generalized sexual deviancy and recognizes there are degrees in this pedophilia.