Shooting on Virginia Tech campus

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(efusco @ Apr 18 2007, 09:09 PM) [snapback]425801[/snapback]</div>

He must have had some sociopathic tendencies also as they can quickly pick up on cues from others to alter their behavior to fit-in and appear normal. Although many cues were missed he for years got away with it 33 dead being the end result. Often these sick souls have multiple afflictions some snap and some just quietly descend into the pit never to return.
Besides he seemed to be a pretty cold emotionless bastard, in the past I had no pity but now after taking a college level class studying these deviants, I really do pity them. Is it better that's he's dead, yes, I think so.

Wildkow
Wildkow

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(desynch @ Apr 16 2007, 08:49 PM) [snapback]424225[/snapback]</div>

Can we let this thread turn into a 2nd Amendment debate yet?

 

Piggybacking onto my rant about second-guessing .... (Relax, I'm not going to continue beating that [hopefully] dead horse.)

It occurred to me yesterday that among the various entities being criticized, my EMS colleagues are not among them. I host a live satellite training program for EMS responders in Virginia on the third Wednesday of each month. At the conclusion of last night's program I thanked the responders for their good work. As I was preparing the program, I searched web sites -- general news and EMS -- for articles specifically addressing the EMS response. There was nothing but praise for the response.

Virginia Tech Rescue Squad is a volunteer agency comprised of students. (I have known many of their members going back 30 years, and I currently work with some former ones.) Judging from this response, today's members are every bit as professional as those of any paid agency with seasoned veterans. So I want to publicly recognize them here -- and all the mutual aid agencies that assisted -- for their good work.

Here is an article posted on an EMS web site that says it all. Here's an excerpt that I read aloud on last night's program:

"Finally, to the members of VTRS [and, I say again, those assisting], thank you for accepting an amazing responsibility to care for your classmates and community. The days and weeks ahead will be filled with mourning. But they will also be filled with critique, analysis, and second-guessing. Be proud of the services you provided on Monday, be confident that you made the right decisions with the training and information you had, and take care of yourselves and one another."

And not to slight the in-hospital colleagues of Evan and the other ER folks that hang here: Kudos as well to them. From all appearances, it looks like they too planned thoroughly and performed well.





<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Hobbs @ Apr 19 2007, 07:28 AM) [snapback]425913[/snapback]</div>

I vote no. I am interested in this thread (obviously), but not debating politics. How about starting a new one?

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(efusco @ Apr 19 2007, 07:45 AM) [snapback]425934[/snapback]</div>

Whoever starts it is a total jerk for using this tragic event as a political engine to spread their agenda.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(zapranoth @ Apr 17 2007, 06:14 PM) [snapback]424928[/snapback]</div>

Well put, I hear the talk in the barber shop of all the what if's & what they should have done...... :angry:
I tell them they are talking out of their butts, if they where there they would have done the same thing the students did..... :mellow:

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(hycamguy07 @ Apr 19 2007, 11:24 AM) [snapback]425995[/snapback]</div>

Amen.

Come to think of it, I'll be making a trip to the barber shop in the next few days. But I think I'll just listen. My barber has a little more right to judge than many. Her son is a VA Tech freshman.

 

Great.

Now, with this a-hole, every loner kid who writes anything socially unacceptable in school will be pegged as a suspected mass murder.

I read those two plays he wrote. Absolutely tame against any great video game with an "M" rating, or any one of a million comic books.

 

All the same Squid, don't you think teachers and professors should be looking out for kids who have clear problems coping with their environment, and getting them the help they need?

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(eagle33199 @ Apr 19 2007, 12:43 PM) [snapback]426084[/snapback]</div>

Sure. Problem is, that sort of thing usually pivots around what someone ELSE thinks is "acceptable" behavior. I'll bet if I was going to grade/high school today, after Columbine, and this mess, I'd be dragged into a shrink's office for the crap I used to draw and write.

Where do you draw the line....

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(eagle33199 @ Apr 19 2007, 12:43 PM) [snapback]426084[/snapback]</div>

You can't force it, though. This guy wasn't a kid. He was 23.

It sounds like some did try to get him help, but again, if he didn't want it, then he didn't have to take it.

 

Another case of bullying it looks like....

http://www.wlwt.com/news/12468306/detail.html

'Long before he boiled over, Virginia Tech gunman Cho Seung-Hui was picked on, pushed around and laughed at over his shyness and the strange way he talked when he was a schoolboy in the Washington suburbs, former classmates said.

'They said Cho had endured years of bullying at school as a teenager and that Cho had a difficult time in school.

'One fellow high school graduate said Cho almost never opened his mouth and would ignore attempts to strike up a conversation. He said once in English class, students laughed at Cho as he read, telling him to "Go back to China."

Another graduate said friends of hers who went to middle school with Cho recalled he was picked on. She said the friends told her that people were really mean to Cho, pushing him down and laughing at him.'

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(efusco @ Apr 19 2007, 08:57 AM) [snapback]426097[/snapback]</div>

In this case, didn't the mental health experts determine he may be a danger to himself, but at the time they interviewed him, he was not a danger to others? That was over a year ago, and things change in that period of time.

Do you have an opinion on the change in recent years (the last 30, anyway) regarding commitment procedures and the new privacy laws that make sharing a patient's diagnosis harder? In the 1950's, we had over half a million people semi-permanently in mental hospitals, and I have heard we have far less today.

 

First Responders

"When you hear the term "first responder" you probably think of police officers, firefighters, or medics.

Here's a first responder people rarely think about: teachers."

"A good teacher is like a candle -
it consumes itself to light the way for others."
-- anonymous

 

I've got nothing but respect and sympathy for teachers. I think teaching is an extremely under appreciated profession..

At the same time, I think it's crazy to compare teachers to police officers and firemen as first responders.. When a madman with a gun starts opening fire, teachers, along with everyone else run away from the nutcase, whilst first responders run towards him.

 

I think the whole mentally ill thing for Cho is blown a bit out of proportion.

First off, it doesn't take too much for someone with some credential to say, "You're a danger to yourself, please go to this hospital for help." It would be totally different if it was some sort of "forceful commitment", but to have a health care professional tell you they're concerned you're a danger to yourself, and *suggest* you get further help, is sort of shaky at best (IMHO of course).

I would say there's no doubt he had SOME degree of mental illness, how much, I've no idea, although you can obviously tell he's a DEEPLY pissed off person in that video, and seems to definitely cross some sort of mental condition/illness line...

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Mystery Squid @ Apr 20 2007, 11:16 AM) [snapback]426778[/snapback]</div>

It wasn't "somebody." It was a judge. You can see the documents regarding his mental health hearing here:
http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/years...419071cho5.html

Why these records didn't blip up when he went to buy a gun is a cause for concern, along with the fact that there seemed to be no follow-up regarding his outpatient treatment.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(MegansPrius @ Apr 20 2007, 12:35 PM) [snapback]426797[/snapback]</div>

Well that changes that... Now I agree with you, how he get got guns with a record as such.... damn...

Then again, I shouldn't be too surprised. My ex-gf's sister owned a .357, was on anti-depressants and had frequent anxiety attacks.



<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Godiva @ Apr 20 2007, 12:26 AM) [snapback]426547[/snapback]</div>

Teachers should just stop teaching.

Let the ocean of idiocy rise to epic proportions, then proceed to control the brainless masses.


Some, would argue, this is already the case.

h34r: