Yahoo news front page irony

[reeshau]

Yet another school shooting.  What is also happening?  Check the under story.

So far to go, to solve the violence...

[bacchi]

Good catch!

Only more guns can solve school shootings (and thoughts and prayers).

[GuitarStv]

Good catch!

Only more guns can solve school shootings (and thoughts and prayers).

If only the Christian school had just prayed enough.

[turketron]

Oh hey, my kid's daycare was on lockdown today for that, it's a couple miles away from this school. They're only 3 so they didn't really even notice anything out of the ordinary happened but definitely a hard day for the parents and teachers. And nothing even even really happened for us, I can't even imagine what it was like for everyone actually affected.

Another Madison, WI institution puts it best:

‘No Way To Prevent This,’ Says Only Nation Where This Regularly Happens
https://theonion.com/no-way-to-prevent-this-says-only-nation-where-this-regularly-happens-2/

[Fru-Gal]

School shootings are usually suicides, and suicides are contagious.

Lockdown drills and locking classroom doors are making a small difference. Here are three critical ways to prevent school shootings without any gun ownership restrictions:

1. Do NOT name or identify school shooters in the news. Treat school shootings the way we treat bridge and train suicides. Both of these are exceedingly common, yet news agrees not to report on either.

2. Put ANY schoolchild who expresses violent plans/thoughts immediately on permanent remote/zoom school. No second chances.

3. File criminal charges on all parents providing their children access to weapons.

 

[reeshau]

School shootings are usually suicides, and suicides are contagious.

Lockdown drills and locking classroom doors are making a small difference. Here are three critical ways to prevent school shootings without any gun ownership restrictions:

1. Do NOT name or identify school shooters in the news. Treat school shootings the way we treat bridge and train suicides. Both of these are exceedingly common, yet news agrees not to report on either.

2. Put ANY schoolchild who expresses violent plans/thoughts immediately on permanent remote/zoom school. No second chances.

3. File criminal charges on all parents providing their children access to weapons.

I appreciate the serious response to try and do something.

I do not think social isolation, alone, is going to positively impact a child with violent tendencies.  Yes, take them out of the current environment, and a threat to peers and teachers.  But how likely is their home environment to play a part in their current state?  So, more of that?  And, what about the parents working?  All that time, home alone?

Doing nothing is clearly not right.  But some kind of mental health treatment is probably the first order of business, with education considerations following that.

I would also say, you preface this with: "...without any gun restrictions."  Clearly, as The Onion article points out, that's the most effective thing to do.  Plenty of evidence around the world about that.  Maybe we do it a different way, but I can't imagine a serious discussion about this problem that concludes with, "Yeah, leave that alone."

[GuitarStv]

America made it's choice on guns and it's hard to see any realistic hope of change.  Ease of buying a gun for everyone in the country is more important than easily preventable gun deaths - the country has resoundingly spoken on this.

[Fru-Gal]

Thx for responding. I fully agree about other methods, but also believe that when reality shows us a strong inertia on a topic, we must approach it from a different angle. This is the system we have.

My main point is about suicide. Why aren’t train and bridge suicides reported in the news?

In fact, a euphemism is used consistently for train deaths (“track fatality” “passenger trespass”), and bridge deaths go completely unreported in my area.

There’s a lot of study on this which you can find by googling “Why aren’t train and bridge suicides reported in the news?”

One study found that people who were stopped from jumping off a bridge did NOT go on to later commit suicide via other means.

School shootings, in particular, are copycat suicide events. When will we start treating them this way?

[Fru-Gal]

After every mass shooting since they started picking up in frequency, media has discussed multiple usual topics:

How the weapon was acquired, type and planning, mental health of shooter, were there armed guards or police present, etc. None of these factors change the result.

Factors that change the outcome of an active shooter include what you are taught in first response: Run, hide, fight.

Locking doors have changed the outcome.

Threats taken seriously have changed the outcome.

Engaging the shooter by tackling or pepper spray or team effort (how we were taught in first response class) have changed the outcome.

What have we not tried yet?

Treating these as copycat suicide events, when academic study shows an immediate drop in suicides by refusing to publicize them.

I know that would be very hard to do, but media could have a boilerplate like “A casualty event occurred at x school. Following local law enforcement violence prevention standards, the assailants will not be named.”

Possibly a law would be required to make this enforceable, as the click-bait situation right now is out of control.

I’m pretty sure such a law would be easier to pass than the other one usually debated.

(I’m not pro-gun and do not own one though I know how to shoot)

[reeshau]

Considering the audience, I don't know that a media blackout would really stop the identity from getting out.  After all, there will be 100-300 directly impacted victims (trauma, if not injury) who can figure out who is no longer reporting to school.  If the news didn't report it, I'm sure it would spread on social media, unless specifically criminalized.

[Fru-Gal]

We already have many such news conventions in America. In our country, it is considered very taboo to show human carnage of any sort. This is not the case in many other countries where you will see a murdered dude on the front page in bloody glory.

There is some sort of love-hate thing going on between America and its children that leads to treating our children as exploitable resources. I think that’s at the root of how we discuss childhood violence, and violence prevention.

[rocketpj]

We already have many such news conventions in America. In our country, it is considered very taboo to show human carnage of any sort. This is not the case in many other countries where you will see a murdered dude on the front page in bloody glory.

There is some sort of love-hate thing going on between America and its children that leads to treating our children as exploitable resources. I think that’s at the root of how we discuss childhood violence, and violence prevention.

Sort of.  I can watch 'children's' movies and television that are absolutely full of carnage (though the protagonist is never harmed).  But America will have an attack of the vapors if a (female) nipple somehow ends up within the vision of a young person.  Even the somewhat sanitized action movies tend to have dozens or hundreds of fatalities.  So much of pop culture is how one person or group  uses a gun to resolve conflict that it is amazing anyone is alive at all.

The overwhelming majority of Americans want some form of rational gun control.  A small percentage of American want no controls whatsoever.  That small percentage also has a very large voice in political discourse, so is able to 'win' the debate by saying it is impossible to change.  Various politicians at all levels are too terrified to take action and actually represent their constituents. 

I used to find this astonishing, but now I just understand that the current system of political power will not allow change, and will keep getting worse until it breaks entirely.  Sadly, 'breaking entirely' is apparently more than a steady metronome of news events about slaughtered children.

[Just Joe]

It's about protecting a multi-billion dollar industry:

- Across the United States, 16.4 million firearms were sold in 2022.
- The U.S. Firearm industry contributes $51.3 billion to the economy.
- The firearms industry employs 169,523 people across the U.S.
- The U.S. firearm industry is worth approximately $28 billion.

https://www.zippia.com/advice/firearm-industry-statistics/

Its just one info source but clearly whatever the info source, guns and their accessories is a multi-billion dollar industry that doesn't want to be legislated away. This is one of those things that  American capitalism will protect at the cost of many innocent lives. This one part of American capitalism that I despise b/c it again illogically puts dollars ahead of everything else.  See other topics that do the same...

[Just Joe]

Our nation worries alot about seatbelts and tobacco - why not guns too?

"This product is..." 

Something written to very dramatic. I know folks who would laugh and buy more.

Real consequences and licenses would be a good start. Put parents in jail when their unsettled teenager shoots up the school or is even caught carrying a gun below a certain age... 

People smarter than I will have to write those rules.

[Just Joe]

I wouldn't mind seeing Alex Jones reduced to the most entry level of jobs.

[rocketpj]

I'm somewhat amazed that at least a few of the gun toting folk who have seen their children slaughtered in the name of profits haven't emulated Luigi Mangione.  I don't advocate it or recommend it in any way, but for a gun fetish nation it is surprisingly uncommon for people to actually shoot the people that cause the problems.

[Fru-Gal]

After every mass shooting since they started picking up in frequency, media has discussed multiple usual topics:

How the weapon was acquired, type and planning, mental health of shooter, were there armed guards or police present, etc. None of these factors change the result.

Factors that change the outcome of an active shooter include what you are taught in first response: Run, hide, fight.

Locking doors have changed the outcome.

Threats taken seriously have changed the outcome.

Engaging the shooter by tackling or pepper spray or team effort (how we were taught in first response class) have changed the outcome.

What have we not tried yet?

Treating these as copycat suicide events, when academic study shows an immediate drop in suicides by refusing to publicize them.

I know that would be very hard to do, but media could have a boilerplate like “A casualty event occurred at x school. Following local law enforcement violence prevention standards, the assailants will not be named.”

Possibly a law would be required to make this enforceable, as the click-bait situation right now is out of control.

I’m pretty sure such a law would be easier to pass than the other one usually debated.

(I’m not pro-gun and do not own one though I know how to shoot)

Wow, check out these two comments I just read on Reddit:

NZ doesn’t publish the names of mass murderers. They often want attention, infamy, especially if it”s an ideological crime, so don’t give it to them.

I still couldn’t tell you the name of the terrorist who shot a bunch of people in a mosque in Christchurch, or the psycho who stabbed a couple of people in a supermarket, or the nasty piece of work that murdered that poor girl Grace Millane.

May their names be quickly forgotten and their prison sentences long.

The Romans called that punishment "damnatio memoriae," "condemnation of memory." They went a bit further and really erased the person from public memory by removing them from official documents and such, but the basic idea applies, and is still relevant.

We should go back to doing that instead of turning mass murderers into these sick celebrities.

Correction, see comment from Holoholokid below: while the practice is real, "damnatio memoriae" is a modern name and was not used by the Romans. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damnatio_memoriae