Virginia Tech Shootings: Eyewitness Reports & Updates

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Discussion Overview

The discussion centers around the tragic shootings at Virginia Tech, exploring eyewitness reports, media coverage, gun culture, and societal implications. Participants express various viewpoints on the causes and consequences of such violence, as well as the role of the media in reporting these events.

Discussion Character

  • Debate/contested
  • Meta-discussion
  • Exploratory

Main Points Raised

  • Some participants share links to news articles and updates regarding the shootings, emphasizing the severity of the situation.
  • There is a strong emotional reaction to the shootings, with multiple participants expressing shock and sadness.
  • Some argue that the media coverage of such events perpetuates a cycle of violence, suggesting that ignoring these stories could help prevent future incidents.
  • Others counter that media coverage is essential and that the root causes of violence are more related to gun culture and societal issues rather than media influence.
  • A few participants discuss the idea that having armed students or teachers could potentially reduce casualties in such situations.
  • There are references to historical patterns of violence in the U.S., with some noting that similar incidents seem to occur with alarming frequency.
  • One participant mentions the motivations behind school shootings, referencing the Columbine incident and suggesting a deeper societal issue regarding the devaluation of human life.
  • Discussions also touch on the differences in gun culture across various states, particularly comparing California to Virginia, and the implications of security measures in schools.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

Participants express a range of opinions, with no clear consensus on the causes of the shootings or the role of media coverage. Some agree that gun culture is a significant factor, while others emphasize the importance of media reporting. The discussion remains unresolved with multiple competing views present.

Contextual Notes

Participants acknowledge the complexity of the issue, including the interplay between media representation, societal attitudes towards violence, and the specific circumstances surrounding the shootings. There are references to the need for further understanding of the shooter's motivations, which remain unclear.

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http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/04/16/vtech.shooting/index.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/16/us/16cnd-shooting.html

http://www.wdbj7.com/ has a video stream from local news[update:
Eyewitness reports are being listed at http://www.roanoke.com/news/wb/xp-113296 ]

[update:
"The Collegiate Times is an independent student-run newspaper serving the Virginia Tech community since 1903."
http://collegiatetimes.com (which, for now, redirects to http://www.collegemedia.com/ ) is trying to report on events. ]
 
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Holy freaking ****!
 
US Shootings at University campus :mad:

Ohh dear... :mad:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/6560685.stm
Deadly shooting at US university
Emergency services at scene
The campus has now been closed and students evacuated
At least 22 people have been killed and 21 more injured after a gunman went on the rampage at the campus of Virginia Tech university in Virginia, US.

Police say there were two separate shooting incidents - one at West Ambler Johnston Hall, a student dormitory, and Norris Hall, an engineering building.

Hope nobody on this board had to go through that ordeal.

I understand this can happen once and a while, but it is become almost predictable in the USA. There seems to have been 2 separate shooting. Crazy
 
Two shootings, what a tragedy!
 
MeJennifer said:
Two shootings, what a tragedy!
yeap... there seems to be a predictable pattern unfortunately
 
Anttech said:
yeap... there seems to be a predictable pattern unfortunately


Unfortunately - It is the news that perpetuates this kind of thing. There might be hundreds of people considering suicide at any given time in the US alone, and this kind of coverage gives these individuals ideas other than the time honored tradition of taking their lives in solitude. The coverage of this latest shooting guarantees the continuation. There will be more! The remedy is to not cover these stories ... period. Let this coverage be limited to those that need to know.

People considering suicide need not be given the option of taking as many as is possible with them. The only way to help prevent the reaccurrence of this sort of crap, is to prevent this sort of idea from entering the brain of these screwed up individuals.

This may sound strange, but the best way to prevent this is to ignore it.
 
That is a massive leap of faith, we are yet to know anything about this persons reasons for doing what he/she did.

This type of thing Must be covered by the press. I find your reasoning rather weak at best. Its nothing to do with the freedom and coverage of information why people do these types of things. IMO I would put the blaime directly on the Guns and culture of violence in the USA, and not on the Press.
 
The post office shootings didn't stop until it became a joke, and by all accounts, these shootings in general will not taper off until we laugh at them, or ignore ... no one suicidal wants to be laughed at or ignored. Todays shooter got exactly what he wanted in spades.
 
Yes, and I agreed with your comment that it has to do with gun culture in America. I also noticed that this sort of thing rarely happens in California (or at least is rarely reported as a shocking school shooting). Instead, we have normalized gang violence. Is there a difference in gun culture or general culture here that discourages school shootings by "civilians" (i.e. non-gang members)? Or maybe allows for alternate ways of dealing with whatever issues shooters have?
 
  • #10
Anttech said:
I understand this can happen once and a while, but it is become almost predictable in the USA. There seems to have been 2 separate shooting. Crazy
It appears that the 'two' shootings were by the same person (still to be confirmed), so its two locations, one event. The shooter is apparently dead. Police have yet to confirm it was a suicide. AP/CNN has reported at least 31 dead (which may include the shooter).

It is the worst campus shooting in US history.
 
  • #11
Anttech said:
That is a massive leap of faith, we are yet to know anything about this persons reasons for doing what he/she did.

This type of thing Must be covered by the press. I find your reasoning rather weak at best. Its nothing to do with the freedom and coverage of information why people do these types of things. IMO I would put the blaime directly on the Guns and culture of violence in the USA, and not on the Press.

You really can't separate the press from the culture of violence in the US. It's not the sole cause of it, but it is a part of it. From football being the most popular sport in the country, and huge hits the most popular highlights, to the old pager alerts whenever a high speed chase was going down and it took over every news channel, violence is celebrated as spectacle everywhere in the press. Media members are Americans, after all, and part of the same culture as everyone else.
 
  • #12
I was linked to http://www.slate.com/id/2099203/" page from a wiki on school shootings. The author explores the motivations of the Columbine shooters and finds that one (Harris) was a psychopath who had a superiority complex.

He is disgusted with the morons around him. These are not the rantings of an angry young man, picked on by jocks until he's not going to take it anymore. These are the rantings of someone with a messianic-grade superiority complex, out to punish the entire human race for its appalling inferiority. It may look like hate, but "It's more about demeaning other people," says Hare.

I think that's a very strong, but subtle attitude in the U.S., the demeaning of human life.
 
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  • #13
Yes, but the Media or Press is purely market driven, the market is there and wants it so it supplies. The press are (should be in a democracy) neutral and only really a leans on what is actually happening.
 
  • #14
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geert_Hofstede

Gauge where you think America is on this scale, I believe the American society to be very Masculine in general now. What happened today is a direct consequence of this.

So how does one change the mindset of millions??
 
  • #15
Had some students and/or teachers been armed, a lot lives could have been saved. Gun-free zones are danger zones. It's easy to kill people when they can't shoot back.
 
  • #16
drankin said:
Had some students and/or teachers been armed, a lot lives could have been saved. Gun-free zones are danger zones. It's easy to kill people when they can't shoot back.

Exactly, you just proved my point :smile:
 
  • #17
Anttech said:
Exactly, you just proved my point :smile:

Your welcome.:approve:
 
  • #18
Anttech said:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geert_Hofstede

Gauge where you think America is on this scale, I believe the American society to be very Masculine in general now. What happened today is a direct consequence of this.

So how does one change the mindset of millions??

Anttech, I'm not really following you. Are you suggesting that Masculinity is somehow wrong or bad?
 
  • #19
0TheSwerve0 said:
Yes, and I agreed with your comment that it has to do with gun culture in America. I also noticed that this sort of thing rarely happens in California (or at least is rarely reported as a shocking school shooting). Instead, we have normalized gang violence. Is there a difference in gun culture or general culture here that discourages school shootings by "civilians" (i.e. non-gang members)? Or maybe allows for alternate ways of dealing with whatever issues shooters have?

The gang shootings, though they don't generally reach the level of spectacle as killing 30 people in one spree, end up killing more people overall. The fact that many schools have installed extreme security measures, like armed guards and metal detectors, might have a lot to do with the lack of large-scale school shootings in California since they seemed to become faddish ten years ago or so.

One interesting thing is that the one major school shooting that happened in California happened just outside of San Diego, which has the lowest homicide rate of any US city with over a million residents. Places like Blacksburg and Littleton and Austin where other shootings have gone down aren't very violent places, either. The only major gun violence scares I can think of that happened in crime-ridden cities are the Washington DC sniper case and the bank robbers that got into an extended shootout with LAPD in North Hollywood back around '95 or '96 and temporarily turned part of the city into an urban war zone.
 
  • #20
I am suggesting that their are some aspects of a heavily masculine society that is bad in this day and age yes. But not everything! What happened today is definitely the worse side of a society that is predominately masculine...
 
  • #21
I disagree that the media responds to just what people want. Look at the dearth of media portraying men as sex objects...are women not a market? In fact, it seems the majority of male sexual appeal is targeted towards gay men, as if women had no sexual desires. The media is just as entrenched in cultural values and often preclude certain ideas and attitudes, acting as a tool of hegemony.
 
  • #22
Death toll is up to 30 (31 including the shooter). Jesus Batman Christ.
 
  • #23
This is such a tragedy. My thoughts go out to the victims and their families and all the students and faculty there who have been affected by this.

At this point, we know nothing about the shooter's motivations, and we do not even know if he was shot by police or if it was a suicide. Regardless, it's pointless trying to rationalize the actions of someone who was clearly not rational.

I don't see how the media is to blame here. Nobody normal watches the news about something like this and says, "Cool, I should try that sometime." This could be someone who was failed out, mocked at a local bar by some students, applied for admission and was rejected, was dumped by a girlfriend for a student there (or who was a student there herself, or both), an escaped convict like the last time they had an incident in August (having a university close to a jail or prison does increase the chances that escaped criminals will be a threat to those on campus), or just someone who had a psychotic break for absolutely no reason whatsoever other than the "voices" told him to do so.

Why don't we wait for the facts to be sorted out from speculation before we start guessing at the motives and pointing fingers.

I also don't see how one would keep such a story out of the news. Let's be thankful stories like this are still enough of a rarity that they ARE news when they happen.
 
  • #24
loseyourname said:
violence is celebrated as spectacle everywhere in the press. Media members are Americans, after all, and part of the same culture as everyone else.

Shades of the Roman Empire, violence was how the powerful kept the commoners entertained. Anything presented by the media has to have the approval of the media Moguls. Ask Imus.

But it is not just the press and news sectors , the media including movies also provides us with all kinds of violent programming.

So which is the horse and which is the cart? Did we get more violent as a result of watching violence? Or did the media present more violence because there was a demand for it? Lately it seems that the horse and cart are spiraling in a vicious circle with one driving the other.
 
  • #25
0TheSwerve0 said:
I disagree that the media responds to just what people want. Look at the dearth of media portraying men as sex objects...are women not a market? In fact, it seems the majority of male sexual appeal is targeted towards gay men, as if women had no sexual desires. The media is just as entrenched in cultural values and often preclude certain ideas and attitudes.

Are you suggesting that woman have the same sexual drive as men? I don't think that would hold up to scientific scrutiny.

Perhaps you are right, the Media is, but the PRESS shouldn't be.
 
  • #26
Anttech said:
I am suggesting that their are some aspects of a heavily masculine society that is bad in this day and age yes. But not everything! What happened today is definitely the worse side of a society that is predominately masculine...

IMO, masculinity is on the decline in the US. Rather, our society is being feminized. The 60s pretty much castrated the US, IMO. All you have to do is talk to older folks born in the 1930s & 40s. Society was much more "masculine" back then.
 
  • #27
So psychopathy is masculine?

Can't say I disagree.

As for changing the minds of millions, look at MLK and the civil rights movement. Or something more mundane, look to the anti-littering movement. How about the green movement? Seems that most major changes aren't able to come about simply from the effort of small groups with little power, but on occasion it can happen.
 
  • #28
drankin said:
IMO, masculinity is on the decline in the US. Rather, our society is being feminized. The 60s pretty much castrated the US, IMO. All you have to do is talk to older folks born in the 1930s & 40s. Society was much more "masculine" back then.

How so? I do agree that men had been feeling threatened by women encroaching on their masculinity and so tried to separate themselves even more from women. Is it manly to be afraid of women?:wink: Ha! I even asked LYN last night if it was manly to fear unmanliness :-p
 
  • #29
0TheSwerve0 said:
How so? I do agree that men had been feeling threatened by women encroaching on their masculinity and so tried to separate themselves even more from women. Is it manly to be afraid of women?:wink:

I wasn't talking about gender. I was talking about society in general.
 
  • #30
loseyourname said:
One interesting thing is that the one major school shooting that happened in California happened just outside of San Diego, which has the lowest homicide rate of any US city with over a million residents. Places like Blacksburg and Littleton and Austin where other shootings have gone down aren't very violent places, either. The only major gun violence scares I can think of that happened in crime-ridden cities are the Washington DC sniper case and the bank robbers that got into an extended shootout with LAPD in North Hollywood back around '95 or '96 and temporarily turned part of the city into an urban war zone.

Exactly. This breed of school shooting seems different to me. The shooters have different motivations and attitudes, as far as I can tell.
 

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