Mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut

http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2012/12/14/shooting-reported-at-connecticut-elementary-school/?hpt=hp_t1

by KenCochrane • 14 years ago

117 322 14 years ago

news.blogs.cnn.com

KenCochrane• 14 years ago

Looks like it is even more now..

This link reports 27 people dead, including 18 children:

http://www.pressherald.com/news/Gunman-killed-in-Conn-school...

so sad

washedup2• 14 years ago

A father of one of the children's... how does our society produce individuals like this? I know there are probably dozens of answers...

edit: just to be clear, I am not a father of one of the children. I was told the shooter was a father of one of the children at the school. Not sure if that is correct.

debacle• 14 years ago

Very many people suffer from undiagnosed mental illness.

An even larger amount just go way off the deep end.

gnu84• 14 years ago

Many who suffer diagnosed mental illnesses roam the streets because we don't care for them. Our mental healthcare system is that of a third world country.

msutherl• 14 years ago

In addition to the problem of wide-spread untreated mental illness, many public schools are much like prisons for kids who have trouble adapting to social norms, both in that they do not grant basic human rights and that inter-student relations are barbaric. I don't know whether the shooter was a student or not, but based on my experience, it is not difficult for me to imagine somebody with less self control acting out in a violent manner.

Sorry for your loss.

washedup2• 14 years ago

Sorry, my comment was poorly worded. I have no relation to the children. However, I was told that the shooter was a father of one of the children of the school, but that has not been confirmed.

untog10• 14 years ago

I can't wait until the part where we all don't talk about gun control and carry on as usual. Sigh.

EDIT: I see my post is being downvoted. I know that it may come across as insensitive to immediately leap to the gun control debate, but frankly I'm more angry than upset by this news. How many times does it have to happen? We have a good 48 hours of emotional outpouring and then everyone forgets it ever happened.

trentlott• 14 years ago

If we gave our children and teachers handguns the problem would solve itself!

dmm6• 14 years ago

What do you mean? That's usually the first thing people talk about when they hear about a shooting. There is always lots of talk. However, it's a divisive issue that many people feel strongly about and it's a constitutional issue.

untog10• 14 years ago

Well, I mean talk seriously. Even in the presidential debates, both candidates ran away from a serious discussion on the topic. I know it's divisive, I know people feel strongly about it, but it appears that no politician is interested in starting a real debate.

hyperbovine5• 14 years ago

I came here to say exactly the same thing. Upvote from me.

Second mass shooting of the week. "Guns don't kill people, ..."? Please.

vyrotek2• 14 years ago

And spoons make you fat

ipince3• 14 years ago

which was the first one?

ceejayoz4• 14 years ago

I like how the "guns don't kill people" like to argue that guns protect people.

mnicole5• 14 years ago

I've seen a lot of confusion about the numbers in the Clackamas (Portland suburb) mall shooting if that's the other one you're referring to. Not sure if it would be considered "mass" even though it was done in a food court, as it was 2 dead besides the gunman, with a third in serious condition but expected to recover. Not negating the significance of it at all or anything, but the shooter stole the gun from someone who was licensed to have it, so that's another issue to address entirely.

TallGuyShort4• 14 years ago

I say the same thing when people in oppressive regimes are silenced with no recourse because the government has no reason to fear it's own citizens. Sigh. I did not downvote your post, but frankly I'm angry that you just assume everyone who is pro-2nd amendment just isn't as enlightened as you are.

untog10• 14 years ago

frankly I'm angry that you just assume everyone who is pro-2nd amendment just isn't as enlightened as you are.

Where exactly do I make that assumption? You'll notice that I didn't even call for a blanket ban on guns, just that, as a nation, we could actually sit down and have a serious talk about whether people should be able to own weapons like this one for private use:

[EDIT: I regret posting the link to the rifle, there's clearly plenty of debate about it that detracts from the main topic of discussion- and we don't know any details for definite.]

https://twitter.com/MarlowNYC/status/279655599585775616

DannoHung• 14 years ago

The weapons needed to resist a regime are not weapons we allow people to generally have in America at any rate.

If we really believed in the 2nd Amendment, people would be allowed to own serious weapons of war but not be allowed to own concealable personal firearms.

hyperbovine5• 14 years ago

Oh, that is such a straw man. In America, the country in which I (and presumably you) live, what's the body count on the ol' oppressive regime-vs-AR15 wielding madman debate anyways? I'm thinking it's on the order of 0 to a couple hundred thousand. If everybody in North Korea owned a shotgun, yes, the world would be a better place. I don't understand why that means children should be murdered en masse, or that I should have to dodge bullets in my own neighborhood (yes, really), all so that you can sleep easier at night knowing that the far-off, nebulous specter of the 'oppressive regime' is held safely at bay by your Colt 45.

hcarvalhoalves• 14 years ago

For all the rationale I ever heard about gun rights, the one you gave here might be the worst ever. If the government should fear it's citizens it's f* up already, you might as well have real diplomatic or military intervention, not let people die fighting in the street like happens right now in Syria [1].

The sad truth is, oppressive regimes exist in the first place because more powerful nations benefit from it. My own country lived for 17 years under an oppressive regime backed by the gun bearing, world's freedom and democracy flagship.

[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKsWGuLzsWk&list=PLC4FDC3...

rymith• 14 years ago

Yup, because here in Canada, we're a horribly oppressed people, and have no hope of ever gaining true freedom because we don't have guns. Please.

balanceiskey152• 14 years ago

Well, why don't we bring it back to technology then?

Everyday on HN there's this drone about the next Instagram or 37 Signals. Or who will produce better email or flamewars regarding the next dominant mobile OS. Time wasted, honestly (Oh yeah, 'I figured out project management, again.')

Where's the debate on HN on how best to handle gun control in the U.S. using technology? Can this community not produce answers for those questions?

untog10• 14 years ago

Well, I think this is an example of technology not being able to solve everything.

Computers are logical and deal in absolutes. People are the exact opposite. Gun control is an emotional, sometimes irrational issue, and the solutions (I suspect) lie in societal changes. Gun control doesn't need advanced technology, as far as I can see. But I'd be interested to know what ideas people have.

protomyth5• 14 years ago

Because its worthless to focus on what they used when finding out why and working on brain chemistry and mental health research using technology would be so much more beneficial to society.

BrianEatWorld• 14 years ago

I think this is the best comment in this discussion. Instead of relying on imperfect governance and enforcement to achieve a goal, which is rationally naive to begin with, why don't we take these imperfections as given and try to work out a solution?

What about security technology? Maybe if the school had smaller, less expensive and less obtrusive metal detectors? Improved inter classroom comm systems for coordinating lockdowns? Cheap, integrated access systems ensuring only qualified personnel and students access the campus?

On the margin, all these could improve the situation without the need for lofty dreams of a societal paradigm shift or pouring hours into a solution that is already exhibiting diminishing marginal returns.

Spooky233• 14 years ago

Gun control is the easy answer. I want to know how we as a society can figure out why people get frustrated, depressed, or angry to the point that shooting up a kindergarten enters into the picture.

We don't know the backstory here, but usually these events are all about someone whose life is spinning out of control for any of a dozen reasons, and either nobody has a clue that anything was wrong or everyone thought that the guy was a timebomb and did nothing.

nollidge7• 14 years ago

And then we let him get some guns.

untog10• 14 years ago

Is gun control the easy answer, or the achievable answer? How can we ensure that no-one's life gets to the point where they shoot up a kindergarten? What exactly are we going to be checking for, and how will we do it?

JagMicker• 14 years ago

It's easy to blame the person --- the offender. But when you think about the way society works, often times the most effective solutions to risk are a combination of social campaigns to educate the masses, as well as physical controls or barriers to prevent bad things from happening.

For example: think about speed bumps. Sure, we could just blame any drivers who crash into pedestrians in parking lots, but by adding speed bumps, we are reinforcing what people already know --- that speeding through parking lots can be dangerous.

Same thing with seatbelts --- you know that annoying chime that won't stop until you've buckled your seatbelt? Why do we need that? Why not simply blame any drivers who crash? Because it reminds people to do what they already know they should be doing. It reinforces safe behavior. It helps to reduce a burden on society --- the negative effects of fatal car accidents.

So I have a hard time whenever I hear someone say 'the problem isn't guns, it's the people who use them', because I think that's only part of the solution. Should people be allowed to purchase firearms "same-day" at gun shows? Should people be allowed to purchase and own as many guns and as much ammo. as they please? Is there something wrong with at least discussing possible reforms to make it more difficult for people to buy guns?

watty• 14 years ago

The reason we carry on as usual is because we don't believe gun control is the solution.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-202_162-57559179/china-school-kn...

Guess we need to control sharp objects as well? It's easy to get angry at dangerous items but in reality it's the people we need to control.

nollidge7• 14 years ago

NONE OF THEM DIED. How do you think that incident would have turned out if the guy had a gun?

proland• 14 years ago

Notice how it says 23 injured, not 30 killed?

That's the difference.

InclinedPlane11• 14 years ago

This has nothing to do with gun control. Guns exist, that can't be stopped any more than preventing alcohol from existing (prohibition), and some bad guys will always have access to guns. Or knives, or diesel fuel, or explosives.

Was the Oklahoma-city bombing a wake-up call for "explosives control"? Was the 2009 Chengdu bus-fire (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_Chengdu_bus_fire) a wake-up call for diesel control? Was the Osaka school massacre (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osaka_school_massacre) a wake-up call for knife-control? Was the 2012 Toronto mall shooting a wake-up call for gun-control in Canada, which already has extremely stringent gun-laws?

It's all too easy to blame the gun in these situations, but guns are just tools, as are knives, and diesel fuel, and even explosives.

It's not the gun. It never was the gun. It's the person.

dradtke3• 14 years ago

That doesn't mean we should start encouraging everyone to carry guns, knives, diesel fuel, whatever. "More guns" isn't the solution any more than "fewer guns" is, but I would still feel safer if I knew that getting a gun was more difficult than a stroll into the corner shop.

slantyyz• 14 years ago

>> Was the 2012 Toronto mall shooting a wake-up call for gun-control in Canada, which already has extremely stringent gun-laws?

IIRC, the talk after the shooting in Toronto was for more countermeasures against illegal guns being smuggled in from the US.

codegeek4• 14 years ago

"It's not the gun. It never was the gun. It's the person."

This kind of zero sum game attitude is a problem in my opinion. yes, Guns are used by people and they don't shoot by themselves. But better controls must be put in place to at least try and keep it away from crazy people. I am saying try, make it harder. If you have a toddler in the house and he starts playing with knives, would you blame it on the toddler ? No, I would say that you need to ensure that the toddler does not get his hands on the knife. Is it possible that he could still do it ? Sure. But is it harder if u hide them? Sure.

onli• 14 years ago

If you look in the history of states which had a problem with gun-violence, you can see that banning guns actually works. After banning, destroying and controlling guns, the amount of massacres and murders falls down. One example of this is germany (i think in the 1970s), but you can look earlier or at the history of other countries to find examples for that.

The situation over here is a tragedy, because all school shootings were commited by sons of fathers who were members of a shooting clubs (and therefore had access to guns). Even though it was not politically possible to ban those clubs and weapons.

But the situation in the USA is even more a tragedy. The USA have shooting after shooting with so many dead kids, and still the political forces are not able to ban guns. Or even slightly control them. Sickening.

gfodor• 14 years ago

Take this argument to its logical conclusion and we should just be handing out firearms to all U.S. citizens, since it's not the guns, it's the people.

w1ntermute2• 14 years ago

> It's not the gun. It never was the gun. It's the person.

So what if it's the person? How can you find those people and stop them from getting guns? All the people who knew the shooter in the Oregon mall shooting a couple days ago said that he showed no signs of being anything other than a kind and friendly person. He showed only a marginal interest in guns. But that could describe hundreds of millions of Americans. You would never be able to find the ones that might do this and make sure they don't get guns.

andylei• 14 years ago

> It's not the gun. It never was the gun. It's the person.

this is such a bad argument. of course its true that the person is responsible, but that's not an argument against gun control.

we can't just lock up everyone that could possibly go on a shooting spree, but we sure can make it harder for a person to go on shooting sprees. make it harder for people to get guns!

> Guns exist, that can't be stopped any more than preventing alcohol from existing

great, but if access to guns was restricted, it would be harder for crazy people from going on shooting sprees.

nobody thinks that all access to guns can be eliminated, but its pretty reasonable to say that if it were hard to get guns, fewer shooting sprees would happen.

> guns are just tools, as are knives, and diesel fuel, and even explosives

this comparison is so clearly bad:

the tradeoffs for society are obvious in each of these cases. knives are pretty dangerous, but they don't really enable someone to rampage through an elementary school to kill 27 people. diesel fuel is pretty dangerous, but it's also really useful to society. i'm pretty sure we already have controls on who has access to explosives.

jcromartie4• 14 years ago

> It's not the gun. It never was the gun. It's the person.

Then we just have an order of magnitude more of that kind of person than Western Europe. If it's not the guns, then Americans are just worse people, statistically speaking, than our more civilized neighbors around the world.

detst2• 14 years ago

I hate the phrase "guns don't kill people, people kill people" because it prevents reasonable discussion but it does get closer to the root of the problem and the solution.

The problem is how we treat mental illness. It's so stigmatized that people feel extreme shame and a sense that they just have to want to be better.

Every single person should be able to walk into a doctor's office, be screened and treated for their illness without the stigma that we attach to it. "Why should I have to pay for it?" This is one, among many, of the reasons. Will it eliminate these incidents? Nope but the result will still be a better society.

hackinthebochs8• 14 years ago

Guns are the problem. Yes a gun is a tool, one that is specifically created to multiply the efficiency of killing. It's purpose is inherently one of magnifying violence. The technology itself deserves condemnation.

Note that I am not advocating getting rid of all guns. But we need to have an honest discussion about them, and that starts with being truthful with ourselves about their very nature.

protomyth5• 14 years ago

I would really rather we talk about mental health and brain chemistry. Objects are easy to vilify, but we are ignoring mental health in this country and this is the result. The number of people walking around with untreated Schizophrenia is seriously problematic. The shooter in NM set off so many warnings that were ignored by people in power that it should have been seen. When the dust settles, I would expect a similar narrative on warning signs.

How many times are we going to find out someone had a history of mental issues and nothing was done? How many people are reluctant to take proper medication because they view the effects of the medication worse than what it trying to treat. We have a lot of people coming back with PTSD, we need to get better at this.

I remember OK and that was farm products (which some companies still sell at automated machines). IEDs, pipe bombs, propane canisters, Molotov cocktails are all capable of killing a lot people and are easier to build or acquire than guns.

untog10• 14 years ago

While I agree with everything you've just said, I'm not sure what the answer is. You have to go and purchase a gun, it's extremely difficult to manufacture one yourself. So, there's a point of control, where we can check people (including, yes, for mental illness).

But mental illness itself has no check point. How can we ensure that people do not have untreated Schizophrenia? Mandatory checks for everyone once a year? I'm really not sure how it could be done.

MattRogish• 14 years ago

Agreed. My wife is a psychotherapist and has seen a lot of what is happening. Mental-health spending by government is down, service is down, and more folks are going without competent mental health services.

Regardless of ones position on guns, it's almost universal that not nearly enough who need mental health care get it. And, our national attitude is still one of "Therapy is for crazy people!" - yeah, just like "the ER is a viable form of preventative healthcare" and "you only go to the mechanic when your car is on fire".

I'm a libertarian but in practice I'm not sure of a solution that isn't more government involvement.

xauronx2• 14 years ago

This isn't hacker news. I'm going to see this depressing, heart wrenching news in a hundred other places... let me have my one safe technology news site :(

marknutter10• 14 years ago

True, but it's a community whose opinion I trust more than most others, so it's often enlightening to read comments about non-hacker news posts once and a while.

xauronx2• 14 years ago

I know... I'm not trying to be a dick about it. My mind just recoils from this stuff.

smspence• 14 years ago

But the comments here are just the exact same opinions/comments that you see/hear everywhere else from people who are arguing about gun control. Nothing valuable or new here at all.

driverdan• 14 years ago

I agree completely. Everyone should flag this and it should be removed.

ColinWright6• 14 years ago

From http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

    Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, ...
    If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic.

Yes, this is important, yes, it's newsworthy. No, it's not "Hacker News". It's all over the news, and there's nothing specific about hacking, or start-ups. It's not even of "deep interest" in any real sense. It's tragedy, pure and simple, and then it becomes politics.

sixQuarks2• 14 years ago

your quote just negated your argument. Read it carefully, it says: "MOST stories about..." Most is the important word here.

This shooting is unprecedented in the US as far as the number of children killed, and will mark a point in history. Considering I don't even watch the news or go to any news web sites, if I hadn't heard about it on HN, I probably wouldn't have even known about it to be honest.

btilly3• 14 years ago

This shooting is unprecedented in the US as far as the number of children killed...

For a shooting, yes. But the 1995 Oklahoma bombing included 19 young children among the 168 killed, including all 17 children in a daycare in the building.

This level of death is, sadly, not unprecedented. And I guarantee you that in 20 years it will be even less remembered by the general public than Timothy McVeigh is.

scarmig• 14 years ago

Flag it, don't post in comments complaining about it.

Then again, your comment reminded me to flag it...

ColinWright6• 14 years ago

I have flagged it, and I'm not so much complaining, as reminding people that this isn't a generic social site, it's intended to be specific to hackers. As such, anything that's not specifically of interest to hackers as opposed to general members of the public, does not belong here.

Yes, this is of relevance to the vast majority of people in the USA, and it should be of major concern, and that's exactly why it doesn't belong here. Sometimes people need to be reminded of that.

Well, that's my point of view.

pg• 14 years ago

Note those words most and probably.

tomasien• 14 years ago

I hear you, and I'm not going to flag this because it just seems like if people want to talk about it they should talk about it. It's just that noteworthy. But it just seems like it's nice to have a place to focus back on your work and you craft.

There is something to be learned from what the HN crowd's thoughts are on this though, but I'm conflicted.

ColinWright6• 14 years ago

Noted. Thank you for replying.

So let me ask - given that this is all over every news channel I have access to, and every other tweet in my feed is about it, do you feel that it's appropriate here?

If so then I will reassess my understanding of what you want this site to be. I appreciate that I might be wrong, and I'm willing, even eager, to assimilate more data on this and adjust my views accordingly.

It's your site - I'm pleased to have the opportunity to gain insight.

DanBC• 14 years ago

I agree.

I'd love to see some innovative thinking from HN, but this thread is mostly the same pro anti gun ravings; confusion about mental health and mental health treatment; etc.

It's intensely interesting, but mostly shallowly so.

sidcool• 14 years ago

And there should be no gun control....Bollocks.

bstewartny2• 14 years ago

Gun control cant and wont solve these problems. These are societal problems. Anyone insane and evil enough to kill children would get guns on the black market or use some other weapon such as a bomb. Schools need to able to have armed guards and better locked/secured entries IMO.

lostlogin9• 14 years ago

Then why is this problem more prevalent in America? I know this sounds like baiting, it isn't. Surely gun laws come into it, even if they aren't the root cause (they aren't IMHO).

potatolicious2• 14 years ago

> "Schools need to able to have armed guards and better locked/secured entries IMO."

Then they will find some other means to do their thing. School buses? Malls? Day cares? The list is endless. Not to mention school shootings are far from the only form of mass murder - movie theaters recently too.

Unless you are ready to sign up for a fortified, bunkered America in all facets, "security" is not a solution to this problem. The vulnerable surface area is all public spaces.

I'd be much, much more concerned about the state of mental health care in this country. No one in their right mind goes and shoots children, nor a theater full of movie-goers - these aren't crimes of opportunity, they are indicative of severe mental disturbance.

Inevitably when tragedies like this come up we get into a big fight about gun control and then forget it ever happened. So rarely do we see any real discussion about preventing someone from seeking out the gun in the first place.

mynameishere• 14 years ago

The kind of guards who are actually capable of armed defense cost 200K/year and work for blackwater.

As for gun control, it's really not possible as you suggest. There are almost 300 million guns in the country. I wouldn't want to be the guy rounding them up.

twerquie• 14 years ago

Why put locks on your house when someone can just break the window? Why wear a seatbelt when the dash of your car will collapse your skull anyway?

mtgx• 14 years ago

But why is it this such a problem or the potential for such a problem so big in US, though? It it because US basically has 10x the population of most European countries, and therefore there ought to be at least one person like this once in a while? Or does this happen because, while some people may be crazy, having crazy with easy access to weapons makes the danger that much greater? I mean I can't say I've heard about many such stories in Europe.

And what about that story that in 2011 there have been 85 bullets shot during the whole year by the police, while in US the police has shot one person alone with that many bullets. Surely the easy access to guns, and to automated guns for the police, has made this that much more possible? And that it also created a culture where if someone just pisses you off enough, you're then very likely to just go and shoot them?

chimeracoder2• 14 years ago

> Schools need to able to have armed guards and better locked/secured entries IMO.

Yes, treating our schools like we treat our prisons is a great paradigm to adopt for our educational system.

purplelobster5• 14 years ago

You make the logical fallacy that just because they CAN still get a gun, that it's equally likely that they will get a gun. It's not. Having to go through hoops to find a gun will result in fewer insane people having guns, it's that simple. It won't prevent all shootings, and certainly wouldn't work very well in the US, since you guys have been flooding the country with guns for a century. In other countries it works quite well though.

josephlord2• 14 years ago

Actually it might in many cases be a knife that is used when guns are not easily obtainable. There has certainly been at least one case like that in the UK. Still horrific but very likely to be fewer people killed and injured.

Schools don't need armed guards. That is kind of ridiculous for every school and a person on a mass murder mission with the element of surprise is very likely to be able to take out a single armed guard before moving on to anybody else. Two or more armed guards is a massive expense especially for small schools. Plus if you put tens (hundreds?) of thousands of armed guards into schools across the country that is likely to bring its own problems too.

Absolutely locked down perimeters have their own problems and still don't help when someone is buzzed in on pretext - "I've got a package to deliver..."

Edit to add: Was very tempted to vote you down for idiocy/wrongness but managed to resist as this is HN and wrongness is not the proper criteria for downvotes.

cobrausn• 14 years ago

Like most places in the Northeast, Connecticut has some gun control laws (especially regarding handguns).

malkia2• 14 years ago

Horrible news. Also in China someone this morning stabbed 22 children at elementary school - wtf... http://blogs.voanews.com/breaking-news/2012/12/14/man-stabs-...

sixQuarks2• 14 years ago

What did he stab the kids with, a spoon? None of them had life-threatening injuries.

ipince3• 14 years ago

Unless you get stabbed on the neck or get your stomach punctured, I think the chances of surviving a stabbing are high.

bigdubs• 14 years ago

This is an incredibly touchy subject, but something that I always come back to when tragedies like this happen is that if a disturbed person wants to hurt people, guns only make it easier.

What does this mean in practice? It can both be an argument for gun control and an argument against. I have no idea where this really comes down. I just know that there are disturbed people in the world, and we need to take a step back and figure out how to prevent them from causing damage in the first place.

marknutter10• 14 years ago

When are we going to start talking about knife control in a serious way?

mattvanhorn2• 14 years ago

When the mass stabbing has more fatalities than the mass shooting. That no one died in the stabbing attack, makes a pretty good argument for some form of gun control.

(Actually, I prefer Chris Rock's idea for bullet control. Make it too expensive to buy enough for mass shootings.)

habosa• 14 years ago

Really not the time for jokes.

alexbell• 14 years ago

It's depressing how we are becoming numb to mass shootings due to their frequency. It seems like a week can't go by without a tragedy like this occurring.

marknutter10• 14 years ago

We're numb to them like we are all other kinds of deaths. Hurricanes, winter, car accidents, tornadoes, etc. There are ways to die are far more preventable than mass shootings that we should be focusing on.

dmm6• 14 years ago

20,000 children starve to death _every day_.

samspot• 14 years ago

I'm not numb to this... it is seriously getting to me. I'm pretty appalled at how may people have jumped at the opportunity to get on their soapboxes in this thread.

grkballer44• 14 years ago

Within a couple years this exact scenario will play out. A gunmen will talk in a crowded place loaded to the gills. Assault rifles, bullet proof vest, explosives hid around the building. He will pull out his gun and kill the poor unsuspecting first soul. After that initial shot someone with a concealed weapons permit is going to blow his brains out cutting his rampage short ( I truly hope the person who plays the hero is a little old lady packing heat in her purse).

owenjones• 14 years ago

You sound excited by the prospect. Personally I feel nauseous at your callous description:

'He will pull out his gun and kill the poor unsuspecting first soul. After that initial shot someone with a concealed weapons permit is going to blow his brains out...'

I truly hope that maybe we work towards a society where mass shootings aren't a monthly occurrence...

nollidge7• 14 years ago

Right, because everybody with a concealed weapons permit is James Bond with perfect aim and cool nerves.

Reality is a little bit messier than your fantasies.

sukuriant2• 14 years ago

The point was that "he with the gun holds the power" in those situations. And I'm sure the person with the gun feels like that. Make the odds of him having his tables turned on him by respectable law abiding citizens, and suddenly he'll be more afraid to do harm.

Ideally.

As a side note, she shouldn't shoot for the head anyway, especially if the bullet is going to go propelling out of the man. That's a great way to have unintended collateral damage.

nwh2• 14 years ago

Then someone blows the old ladies brains out thinking that she is the shooter. Nice plan.

bcoates5• 14 years ago

I always hear people worrying about this, but it doesn't sound likely at all. Has it ever happened?

bcoates5• 14 years ago

Attempted mass shootings that fail like that don't get nearly as much news attention...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Colorado_YWAM_and_New_Life...

khuey• 14 years ago

That guy was working security at the event and was a trained (ex-)LEO. Most people who have their fantasies about using their concealed weapon to save the day don't have nearly that much training or preparation.

jacquesm4• 14 years ago

Note that these things are pre-meditated and that the people doing this are clever enough to hit soft targets.

Little old ladies with guns are typically not present in grade schools, nor would you want them to be because their weapons could be taken away from them and used against others.

king_jester4• 14 years ago

How will common small arms deal with a determined gunman with assault protection gear, esp. in a chaotic, high stress situation like that? We would be better off finding a way to lessen and stop these kinds of events from occurring.

jacquesm4• 14 years ago

The psychology behind the kind of people that could do a thing like this baffles me completely. Insanity doesn't begin to describe it. Parents should not have to worry about whether or not their children are safe in school. At the same time armed guards at school are not a solution either, then you might as well turn it into a mini prison.

What a sad sad day.

Even countries with gun control have instances like this (but they're arguably less frequent), and some countries with lots of guns have almost no problems like this at all (Switzerland for instance).

Just trying to imagine dropping a grade school kid off at school to find them dead in the afternoon from an insane thing like this I find that I can't do it, it is just too far from what I can still imagine. And I have a pretty rich imagination...

This world could be so nice, why does it have to be such a crappy place?

chimeracoder2• 14 years ago

> This world could be so nice, why does it have to be such a crappy place?

Nice stuff happens. It just doesn't make (or sell) the news. But that doesn't mean the world isn't nice.

jacquesm4• 14 years ago

Nice stuff happens but I find it hard to come up with a single instance that offsets grade schoolers being murdered in cold blood. Stuff like this just makes me want to cry.

pdeuchler3• 14 years ago

In my ever so humble opinion, it's a population issue.

When you have a population size of 300 million you're going to get a lot more outliers (crazy people) than if you have a population of 7 million. Statistically, you will also have crazier people.

ceejayoz4• 14 years ago

> When you have a population size of 300 million you're going to get a lot more outliers (crazy people) than if you have a population of 7 million. Statistically, you will also have crazier people.

So consider the EU, with a roughly equivalent population.

Statistically, once you hit a few million people, you've got enough people involved that the proportion of outliers has stabilized pretty well.

kannan• 14 years ago

I come from India, thrice more populous than US, things like these rarely happen there. Please don't blame it on a singular aspect. A lot of things are in play here,to name a few

1. Easy availability of guns 2. Lack of a family based society. In my opinion, insanity gets aggravated by loneliness

soapdog• 14 years ago

Brazil is as big as the U.S. and we don't have this kind of trouble here often. I am 32 and I remember it happening twice in all those years and in both cases the shooter said he was inspired by U.S. shootings...

I don't believe the shooters are mentally ill. There is simply sad, evil people in the world that think that shooting a lot of people will get them some attention/fame/recognition. In a society like the current U.S. society where being unknown and alone is worse, in the mind of some people, than being known as a serial killer this kind of thing is bound to happen.

Due to the nature of your society, you will never ban firearms. They will always be available and those wanting to kill can always find another ways.

In mu humble opinion, your problem lies in the fact that some very weird and sad people there find that serial killing is a glamorous life/ending. The worship or desire of a thug life or being known/recognized as a criminal by the media and society drives these wackos towards this behavior.

When consumerism is king and money/oportunity/perspective is low, when not being the most popular thing ever is worse than dying, when parents don't impose limits to their kids and just keep pumping meds into them, this disaster will keep happening.

purplelobster5• 14 years ago

Can pro-gun people please stop using Switzerland as their go to argument? Do you know why they have so many guns? Because people who have done military service are required to keep a rifle locked up in their house. These are trained people who have gone through psychology tests and military training. That is very very fucking different than the situation in the US.

pdeuchler3• 14 years ago

Because as we all know, psychology tests and military training are foolproof for sifting out the crazies.

jacquesm4• 14 years ago

I wouldn't qualify myself as 'pro-gun', rather the opposite.

Switzerland is interesting in many ways, one of which is the degree to which the government is very close to a true democracy, the fact that they don't waste a ton of money on their defence (which has a lot to do with them being in a geographically special position) and in the way that they have guns but abuse is low.

The fact that this is very different to the situation in the US might hold some clues to what could be done about this.

dmm6• 14 years ago

Reread what he wrote, I don't think he was using Switzerland as a progun argument.

redthrowaway• 14 years ago

I'm Canadian, so my insight into the US' situation is limited, but the reason pro-gun people keep bringing up Switzerland is that it puts the lie to the idea that more guns, or even "scary" guns like assault rifles, leads to more crime. Switzerland has huge gun ownership by responsible, trained adults. In addition, it has incredibly low poverty, excellent social services, very low crime rates, and a very high GDP/capita. The argument among pro-gun liberals like myself is that it is the latter factors which affect gun crime far more than the mere prevalence of guns.

code4life2• 14 years ago

One way to reduce the possibilities of a crime like this is to reduce the centralized system of public education.

My family home schools our children. It coincidentally helps solve this particular problem. (Perhaps it also reduces the likelihood that we spread viruses like the flu).

Making public education more distributed by the use of technology could certainly help with security.

ipince3• 14 years ago

How do you have them have social interactions with other children and adults? (Just curious since I believe it's extremely important).

ceejayoz4• 14 years ago

Unless you ban everyone from stadiums, malls, movie theaters, and other such venues where people congregate, I don't see how that'd do anything to reduce mass shootings.

jweir2• 14 years ago

Something to be aware of

Ruger's 1 Million Gun Challenge http://www.ruger.com/micros/million/about.html

goostavos• 14 years ago

I fail to understand the point of your comment. Why do we need to be aware of a gun manufacturer wanting to sell guns?

jweir2• 14 years ago

Wanting to sell guns is a given.

I was surprised(not shocked) to learn of the contest for one manufacturer to sell over a million guns in one year with the goal of increasing funding for lobbyists.

1.2 million guns is a lot of weapons to sell in a year.

paulhauggis2• 14 years ago

A news anchor on CNN had a theory about how as a society, we are becoming less empathetic because of our tendency to have more and more online relationships.

Just look at the people on Twitter and even here on HN. You act very differently than you would in real life. I almost wonder if there is something to this and has an effect on some people, which leads to less empathy in real life.

paulhauggis2• 14 years ago

I guess HN really is going down hill. I wasn't trolling at all and genuinely had some thoughts on the topic, and I am downvoted with no comment.

jwwest• 14 years ago

First off, the school shooting is a complete tragedy, there's no two ways about it. It's sickening and frustrating and depressing. I can't imagine what something like this does to a person or how a person is drawn to do something like this.

However, our world isn't any different than it was. There's hope in everything. Crazy, murderous people have always existed and will always exist. Life has always had tragedies, even ones bigger than this. As humans, we're designed to look at the most recent thing and go "oh my god, this is the worst thing ever" in order to deal with problems - it's just how we're designed.

What I'm getting at is that the world will be here tomorrow, and it's not ending any time soon. There's plenty of hope in this world, we just lack the proper context sometimes:

1) Your children are more at risk dying in a car accident or eating crappy food than a school shooting.

2) You're more likely to die of a lightning strike than a terrorist attack.

3) If we couldn't have guns, he would have used a knife.

Be hopeful for the world.

mvleming• 14 years ago

I think we have to be careful when things like this happen. It's god-awful. I can't imagine if I was in third grade and a guy barged in and started shooting up the place. But this makes me think of "You can always find evidence for your beliefs." I could take this story as evidence that the world is such a crappy place, but I don't believe that so I won't.

Everything will be okay.

jwco• 14 years ago

here is a way to combine technology and transparency to make it more difficult for someone to do this:

guns owned in America have mandatory geolocation installed. guns lock if geolocation is disabled or hacked, an alert is autosent to local people and authorities with the last known location, and law enforces speedy investigation of the guns whereabouts and reinstallation of the geolocator. i'd like an app that tells me where the nearest guns are to me and some info about who they belong to, i.e. police, citizen, military etc. if a gun is brought near public spaces, schools, theaters, etc., it should tweet, sms, or otherwise alert local police and anyone who would like to know. i'd like to also set my own alerts, such as alert me if a non-police gun is within a few hundred feet of my location, or my kid's location, etc. the constitution says there is a "right of the people to keep and bear arms," but does not use the word "right" to defend privacy.

JoeCortopassi• 14 years ago

Listen, there are two parts to this: 1. The horrible tragedy, and 2. The hopes to prevent this from happening again. If we are going to talk about this, we need to all fall under the assumption that we agree that this is both a very tragic act perpetrated by someone who is obviously disturbed/mentally ill, and that it is all of our desires to do what we can to make sure senseless acts of violence like this never happen again.

So where do we go from here? How do we prevent this from happening again? It seems that there are two schools of thought (generalizing obviously): 1. Disarm everyone, and 2. Allow everyone to carry weapons. Regardless of which side you fall in, neither work perfectly unless they are complete (i.e. all weapons are gone thus criminals don't even have access, or everyone is armed and no one has the upper hand). The problem with both absolutes, is a deranged person will always find a means to carry out their ill will, whether that's a gun/knife/driving a car into a crowd.

The safest computer is encased in concrete, and buried 6 feet underground. Much in the same way, the safest society would have each of us locked in a room, with no interaction. What we have to figure out is this: How much liberty do we all give up, to limit the devastation of the senseless acts of a few?

r00fus2• 14 years ago

> 1. Disarm everyone, and 2. Allow everyone to carry weapons.

Nice strawmen. There are obviously options in the middle, namely, increasing traceability of weapons and ammo and shutting down channels that where weapons are allowed to change hands anonymously.

The proliferation of weapons is one thing, but the fact that these tragedies occur and we don't have a way to follow the chain back to the disreputable dealer who sold these armaments - and shut them down - is just non-sensical.

The 2nd amendment fundamentalists who don't even want question how these weapons can get in the wrong hands - often use that same strawman you pose above - which is rediculous - many folks support the 2nd amendment yet find the need for further action to prevent these events from happening.

dmm6• 14 years ago

> increasing traceability of weapons and ammo

The guns used in shootings are usually legally bought. There are no disreputable dealers here.

dsl• 14 years ago

Disreputable dealer? I absolutely agree, any car used in a drunk driving accident should be traced back to the dealer responsible, and they should be punished.

If you can determine in advance who the "wrong hands" are, I'm sure the TSA would love to speak to you and dump buckets of money over your head.

jlgreco16• 14 years ago

I am personally a fan of another a solution along another axis entirely: a complete overhaul of our medical system, notably in this case the way we detect and handle the mentally ill. (A part of that could be mental evaluations for those who want to buy guns.)

marknutter10• 14 years ago

The guy used basic handguns in this shooting. The problem is his mental health, not his access to guns. If he were motivated enough, and guns weren't available, he could use any manner of other means to kill a bunch of people - bombs, molotov cocktails, home-made flame throwers, samurai sword, vehicles, etc.

baddox3• 14 years ago

I think you mean false dichotomy, not straw man.

jcromartie4• 14 years ago

Most mass shootings are done with legally-obtained firearms.

king_jester4• 14 years ago

If you believe that the shooter in this case was disturbed or had mental illness (I've seen no reports to conclude this, btw) then the first thing you would demand is 1) better mental health care facilities and treatments for the public at large and 2) universal health care systems to provide the least possible friction in accessing those mental health care services.

Also, you don't have to be either for banning guns or having no regulations at all. Instead, a compromise of allowing regulated gun ownership would be better.

jlgreco16• 14 years ago

Is sanity really a possibility here? Sure, we don't have a diagnosis, at least yet, but I would say by definition this person was not sane. A mass shooting is no crime of passion.

It seems to me that there are two problems here. The first is that we suck at finding/handling the mentally ill. These mass shootings are rare, but the connection between crime and mental illness in this country is anything but.

The second issue is of course that we do a piss-poor job of keeping guns away from the people they need to be kept away from.

Ideally both issues should be tackled.

cheeseprocedure2• 14 years ago

We[1] need to begin tearing down the stigma of mental illness before better care can really have an impact.

[1] Canada/the US, at least; I'm not familiar enough with other cultures.

mc32• 14 years ago

If this was a mental illness issue and we agreed to provide better or universal mental health care, how would one have everyone who needed treatment submit to evaluation and treatment? Assuming we agreed upon and used professional guidelines to evaluate people's mental health.

Would people be coerced? Would it be voluntary? If voluntary, I suspect only a fraction of those who had serious issues would seek help. On the other hand, there would be serious issues with legally compelling people to be treated involuntarily, if they have not violated nay other major laws which would make their treatment compulsory.

recoiledsnake4• 14 years ago

The problem is that easy availability of guns amplify the destruction that can be perpetuated by mentally unstable individuals. A similar incident happened in China today where 22 kids were stabbed by one perpetrator but not one had life threatening injuries. What if Walmart China sold guns like the US one does? How many innocent kids would be dead today?

> How much liberty do we all give up, to limit the devastation of the senseless acts of a few?

Liberty? What about the liberty not to get randomly shot down and you or your loved ones' life taken away from you and the people who know you? Isn't the gift of life the supreme liberty taking precedence over the need of some to worship guns?

The ability to take away someone right and liberty to live at a moment's notice borders on a superpower and should be handed out very sparingly to those who absolutely need it to do their job.

notdrunkatall5• 14 years ago

The right to bear arms isn't some trivial notion to be tossed aside when it is no longer convenient to maintain. It is a fundamental right that was given to the people by those who founded our government that we would be able to fight back against that same government were it to ever become oppressive. Every day, we increasingly see the infringement of our civil liberties, and it seems obvious that the desire of the government to continue broadening its scope of power at our expense is not likely to abate any time soon.

I ask you: if this trend continues, where do you think it leads?

Our guns are our final check against the formation of a potentially oppressive regime; they are our assurance that we will never become helpless, that we will always have the capability to fight if fighting ever becomes necessary. Though it is certainly a great tragedy that these children have died today, how much greater were the tragedies throughout human history that resulted from the excessive centralization of power and a populace that was unable to fight against it? You think that human nature has changed in the last half century; you think that something like that cannot happen again, that it won't happen here? People have not changed; sociopaths still seek power, and when they find it, if the masses have no way of fighting back, they will find themselves dealing with problems many orders of magnitude more horrific than the occasional school shooting. I am familiar with all of the arguments for disarming the people of the United States, and they are all fundamentally flawed, because nothing is worse than being at the mercy of tyrants.

eik3_de• 14 years ago

Some data: In the US, there are about 3.45 homicides with firearms per 100,000 population per year. In Germany (where I live), this figure is 0.19, that is roughly factor 18.

onetwothreefour• 14 years ago

Let's not bring logic and facts into an argument about guns with Americans.

The simple fact is that Americans are exceptional, so anything that happens outside the US is irrelevant.

benjohnson• 14 years ago

I would counter that you need to go back 70 years to see how well a disarmed German population.

wlll• 14 years ago

Option 3. Prevent widespread news coverage: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PezlFNTGWv4

Though that seems about as likely as "1.Disarm everyone".

jdlshore• 14 years ago

This video needs more attention.

lostlogin9• 14 years ago

Is it France that has some kid of law like this? Here in New Zealand papers have some kind of thing where suicides aren't usually reported where young people are concerned. I believe this relates to something the Ministry of Health organises.

abstractbill2• 14 years ago

It seems that there are two schools of thought (generalizing obviously): 1. Disarm everyone, and 2. Allow everyone to carry weapons.

I think these are actually two extreme positions to which almost nobody seriously subscribes.

tshaddox• 14 years ago

It depends whether "disarm everyone" is meant to include exceptions government law enforcement and legitimate hunters. If so, then I do think most people (in the USA, at least) subscribe to one of those schools of though.

jcromartie4• 14 years ago

We don't need to prevent this from happening again. We need to stop these things from happening again and again and again.

It's shocking but it's not surprising, because it's almost a predictable event in the US today. Hardly a year goes by in the US without a shooting spree, at schools and otherwise.

schrototo2• 14 years ago

It is utterly fascinating to me how much discussion there is around this, here on this forum and in other places. In no other country in the world would this even be a debate...

Of course you want to disarm everyone!

That is the only sensible option! There is absolutely no need why anyone, save members of the executive branch enforcing the government's monopoly on violence, would ever need to carry a firearm.

"Self defense" and "liberty" are totally crazy arguments, that are only ever brought up in America and are based purely on historical reasons.

thetabyte• 14 years ago

I'm genuinely interested—is this the consensus opinion of most of the developed world outside of the US?

I'm a US citizen, and generally consider myself liberal and progressive. I favor much stricter gun control laws. But I'm not sure I do favor complete disarmament of the citizenship. I do believe that the knowledge—not the use—of citizen's arms does provide a reminder to the government in times of crisis.

But am I simply experiencing large cultural bias? Is there any research on this? Any evidence I can look to? I'm very curious.

malkia2• 14 years ago

Do you think a gun would help you survive? - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8QjZY3WiO9s

ryusage• 14 years ago

Am I the only one who finds it strange (or even slightly disturbing) that this is essentially an after the fact live-blog of the event? For those connected to this school, I can understand wanting information and not wanting to wait. For anyone else, it just seems like obsessive rubbernecking taken to the extreme.

mkr-hn• 14 years ago

I recommend against reading the principal's last tweets.

AlexMuir• 14 years ago

Awful, tragic things happen every day. Some can be prevented and some can't. It's highly unlikely that this is saddest thing to have happened in the world today.

There are a certain percentage of people in the world who will kill people for no reason, molest children, order executions and market crystal meth to young mums. This has always been the way, and will always continue to be.

Now I'm not belittling it as a tragedy, but we have to accept that some terrible things just happen and cannot be prevented or deterred. They always have, and they will continue to do so.

Sometimes there is no lesson to be learned, and we have to accept that what we've seen is a manifestation of human nature, in the same way that lightning is a manifestation of nature itself. Neither are predictable, preventable and both will happen forever.

btilly3• 14 years ago

This is a tragedy, but why is it on HN?

From http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html we have:

Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic.

That fits this story.

ColinWright6• 14 years ago

I said the same thing here:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4922380

PG himself has chimed in to point out the words "most" and "probably".

I'm with you, but we seem notto be in accord with the site owner.

btilly3• 14 years ago

It seemed to me that PG took a neutral stance.

crazygringo• 14 years ago

This may seem tangential, but I swear it's not. We live in a country (US) where growth and progress is measured primarily in GDP. Poverty is measured economically. People's happiness is blithely assumed to be some kind of function of their economic well-being, especially because that can be measured.

There are alternative ideas like "Gross National Happiness" that attempt to measure what could arguably be called the end, as opposed the means (economic). This is generally presented as an alternative goal, to raise the "GNH" of a country. And it's certainly a valid one.

But what if, even more importantly, it's not the gross "national happiness", but rather its distribution?

The perpetrator in this horrible tragedy was clearly horribly unhappy, and almost certainly with severe mental problems. But this isn't a private concern, because in cases like this it becomes a national problem.

When are we going to stop concentrating so much on economic progress and GDP, and start considering how our society and institutions provide for people at the bottom rung of the "happiness" ladder? When are we going to move mental health from a "side issue" about "sick people" that "doesn't concern me", to a central national priority?

There's so much work to be done, and it's barely even a blip in the conversation.

marknutter10• 14 years ago

You may be incorrectly assuming that wealth makes people happier.

the_economist3• 14 years ago

I don't think it's a matter of focusing on happiness. Mental illness a medical issue, like cancer and heart disease.

We need to develop a cure, and when we do, days like this will be far less common.

Kilimanjaro• 14 years ago

Please, if you want to go postal, don't aim at our kids, aim at the politicians.

Drain your frustrations with those who destroy our future, not those who will build it.

pchivers• 14 years ago

Here is an interesting infographic from the National Post:

http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/07/28/guns-ownership-aroun...

"In 2007, the U.S. had the highest gun ownership rate in the world - an average of 88 per 100 people. But the U.S. does not have the worst firearm murder rate - that prize belongs to Honduras, El Salvador and Jamaica. In fact, the U.S. is well down the list with a rate of 2.97 per 100,000 people. Below is a list of countries with available firearm data from 2007 starting with countries where firearms are most common."

loup-vaillant• 14 years ago

While I don't want to diminish the magnitude of the tragedy described here, I'd like to remind everyone that there are many other causes of untimely death that, while mundane, are much more lethal. Take for instance car crashes, or most diseases.

If the goal is to fight untimely death, we should take a hard look at the cold numbers. One will find for instance that smoking scenes in films kill far more people than those shootings. [1]

No, it should not happen ever again. However, we should not forget about the other priorities.

[1]: Regular exposure to smoking scenes makes children and teenagers far more likely to smoke later on. Smoking makes you far more likely to have cancer and such. And having cancer most likely shorten your lifespan. Despite the 3 layers of indirection, the numbers are so massive that a single smoking scene in a blockbuster is probably more lethal than a fully loaded gun.

Mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut

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