Manchester bleeds

As someone who grew up with Manchester as my closest big city, I was particularly angered by this one.

I'm willing to bet that there's a good reason that this 22-year-old idiot chose to target a concert that would be full of teenage girls. These will be ciphers for the girls who weren't interested in this social and intellectual inadequate, and he wanted to take revenge. "Radical Islam" was just an excuse - this little s--t just needed to find something, anything, that would make him feel a bit worthwhile and take revenge on tll girls because the ones he'd met didn't like him (and they didn't like him because he was pathetic.

If he were actually a Muslim, radical or otherwise, he wouldn't be murdering people. Mancunians, I'm sure, will have the good sense to recognise this.

It is rare, as you know, that I would agree with your President (and I hope my saying that doesn't move this thread into purgatory, because I'm not making a political point). But he was the only world leader who called this arse what he was: a loser. Calling him "evil" or "a terrorist" glorifies him, and remembers him as he wants to be remembered. Calling him a loser identifies what he was and remembers him as he deserves to be remembered.

This is something we should always do with these people: whether they claim to be radical Islamists or white supremacists or Hindu or Buddhist or Jewish extremists or whatever - including the allegedly-Catholic muppets who were the last lot to bomb Manchester (1996 Manchester bombing - Wikipedia). They are pathetic, sorry excuses for human beings who think that the only way they'll ever achieve something worthwhile is through attacking defenceless people. They cling on to some s--tty ideology because it gives them an identity and makes them think they matter. In reality, whatever the ideology is, it's nothing more than a crutch for a substandard personality.

For the Manchester attacker, these are the things we should remember - and the same goes for the perpetrators of similar attacks.

He was not a terrorist; he was just a murderer.
He was not a Muslim; he was just a w--ker.
He is not a martyr; he is just dead.

 

do they have metal detectors into these venues? i haven't been to a concert recently, but all the sports venues around here are pretty strict.

 

People who were at the concert said that security was unusually lax, even for that particular venue. They said there were some cursory bag checks, but nothing else. I suspect that this was more to make sure that people weren't smuggling drinks in to avoid paying high prices at the venue, rather than checking for weapons and stuff.

I used to go to a lot of concerts in Britain and there were no security checks, but that was back in the innocent days when only the IRA was blowing us up.

At concerts in Australia, the police search for drugs, but not usually weapons. The last time I saw any security - bag checks and stuff - was for Asian Cup soccer matches, which were international games. I haven't seen anything like that at domestic soccer or Aussie Rules matches.

 

huh. since 911, we have had metal detectors, wands and bag searches. not much allowed in for bags anyway.

 

In Australia, we only have this at big, high-profile events. Britain is a bit stricter, but not much.

 

Entrance security does nothing about those who mingle with the masses exiting the venue.

Coming from about anyone else, I'd agree. But coming from Trump, the term has a very different and seriously diluted meaning.

As his ghostwriter pointed out last week, he has no concept of right and wrong, only winning and losing. His team, those loyal to him, are 'winners'. Many hundreds of people who don't support him, cross him, run against him in the political primaries, or post unfavorable news stories about him, are 'losers'.

President Trump called these people and groups 'losers'
The definitive list of every person Donald Trump has called a loser - Macleans.ca
Trump called terrorists ‘losers’ — the same insult he has thrown at CNN, Ted Cruz and many others - The Washington Post

 

Good point. There's really very little you can do about this.

 

very little@8. If that remains so, then we are permanently at risk from deranged, suicidal folk who have access to certain materials. A dark view of future. Would that there were but one religion (misinterpreted or otherwise) that led to such. It could be a tangible target. But I guess that derangement is both narrower and broader.

 

Don't write it off yet. I'm suspecting there will be some improvements here.

Entrance gathering areas before the checkpoints will need more attention too.

 

Any place on earth where one can anticipate 100 people in close proximity. Walk to center and push one's last button.

I reckon that such places are hyperabundant.

 

Deranged, suicidal folk who have access to certain materials (the most important being stupidity, if one can call that a material) are something we can do little about. If it's not religious extremism, they'll find something else - race, or sexuality, or politics, or whatever other idea they can pledge their pathetic allegiance to.

We're a long way from there being one religion that leads to such things. I know far too many people who've been killed in the name of, or fled violence in the name of, just about every religion I can think of.

 

But, as @tochatihu says, people will gather.

I think the most efficient place I've been for this sort of processing was the third-place soccer playoff in the 2008 Olympics. There was airport-level security - metal detector gates, baggage x-rays, no liquids, etc - and a crowd of just over 50,000, but still I made it from stepping off the Metro train to sitting in my seat in well under 10 minutes.

However, for about six of those ten minutes, I was in an only partially-secured area. Before that, I was on an unsecured train, and before that, walking through an unsecured area to an unsecured station at the start of my journey. In all of those areas, I was part of a large crowd. There really is nothing you can do about this sort of thing, short of an overwhelming police state, which isn't a price I'm willing to pay.

And you don't even need to think just about special effects. Think of most cities' metro systems, for example - you'll often have 1,000 or more people in close proximity at a station.

 

so this happened outside the venue? i missed that. certainly, you can blow up a hundred people just about anywhere, if that is your desire.

 

This reaction was put forth as the proper one to 9/11. The perpetrators and their supports saw themselves as warriors fighting the 'good' fight. By declaring a war on terror, we just reinforced their belief.

We've always been at such risk. Some materials might make these folk more effective at their goal, but increased population and density has more to do with the increased numbers of victims.

The only solution I see is in better education and training in rational thinking, and improving the diagnosis and treatment of mental illness. The last includes destigmatizing it.

 

Yes, at the exit, as people were coming out.

 

not much you can do about that i guess. it's the same at all the sports venue's i attend. in fact, the metal detectors and wands just create a larger crowd on the incoming side.
why are the bad guys always one step ahead?

 

These appealing actions result in a prolonged flurry of headline publicity via the media which resonate right around the world. This often serves to encourage marginal would-be killers and is oxigen to the flames of the malcontents out there.