zlacker

>>KenCoc+(OP)
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?

>>JoeCor+B5
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.

>>king_j+X6
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.

>>jlgrec+f8
In order for someone to be considered "insane" in court they have to have a mental illness so severe it prevents them from comprehending the nature and consequences of their actions.

Serial killers in general are perfectly aware of what they are doing, they just don't care about the judgement imposed by society on such actions and at the same time the personal payoff is too great to ignore.

>>lookAC+ry
Court smourt, the law can do as it pleases, though the guy is dead so that doesn't really matter here.

What we should be concerned with is how we as a society handle mental health as a medical condition, not as a legal defense. I am talking about early detection, treatment, and if necessary preemptive detainment, not about how we handle the people we who have already gone Rambo.