Earlier today, a student opened fire in a lecture hall at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb, Ill in a new Valentine's Day massacre:
The shooting took place during an introductory geology class at the university's Cole Hall in the campus center around 3:15 p.m. local time. Some 163 students were registered for the class.
"The assailant began firing into the assembled class from the stage — from the front," Peters said.
He described the incident as a "very brief rapid-fire assault that ended with the gunman taking his own life."
My heart goes out to the victims and their family - it's a senseless, crazy tragedy.
What a tragedy. Peace and prayers to the victims and their families.
Yeah, I totally agree. Neatorama has had some weird posts as of late.
Well, since it's impossible to stop everyone from carrying guns, Jerse's solution is more realistic.
163 students are in a classroom. Each student is armed.
1 ex-student comes in, starts shooting.
How many students fire back? Out of those students, how many actually hit their intended target? How many actually end up wounding other students?
What is the total number of deaths once all 164 people in the room stop firing?
Show your work.
What a world... :(
This guy COULDN'T carry a gun with him. That is felony in Illinois, and its a further felony to have a gun on a college campus. Yet, he did. That is the thing, criminals don't care about what the CAN and CAN NOT do... they just break the laws.
Now, if the mad-man knew that there were even 5% of students who legally COULD have guns on campus, by virtue of being trained and licensed, do you really think he would have picked that place for his massacre? Historically only ONE recent mass shooting has occurred where a mere civilian could legally possess a firearm, that one was in a Colorado church, and the gunman was STOPPED by an armed woman who the press later demonized .
There are gun stores all over america, so it's not exactly difficult to obtain a gun, even if you don't buy it yourself it could be stolen from someone who had one. If guns for civilians were banned almost completely, like in England (okay there is still some gun crime but not nearly on the scale as in America), then I'm pretty sure this wouldn't have happened. It's only because guns are available that the guy even thought of doing this.
And I love how all Americans immediately say that if everyone was armed it wouldn't have happened. For a start, they didn't know the guy was armed till he started shooting, so people still would have died. And how many people in that crowd, if they were all armed, would actually react in time, and have had sufficient training to take out the gunman (not to mention the moral effect of shooting someone)?. Surely revealing that you yourself were armed would make you a target?
I understand that the security at the university should carry guns, provided they're used appropriately, but having everyone carry guns could have just led to more deaths, possibly accidental by the other students.
This has happened so many times now, its hard to believe that people still support the old system.
Maybe we'd have a lot less accidents from drunk driving if everybody drove drunk, too.
thats right a gun + there are many types of criminals
some might think 2 some may not
but dont go comparing guns to drunk driving
If everyone carried a gun, gun crime now would seem insignificantly low.
If noone carried a gun, we don't know how many people he would have killed.
There are arguments on both sides, so lets not get into that one.
But morally, is it right to shoot someone who's shooting others? Does it not make you as bad/debased as the person doing the shooting to begin with?
It's all a question of angles...
And I agree, this isn't "neat." However, I did appreciate Alex's empathy. Thank You.