National, Regional and Local News

[Suliso]

Lucky for you all he wasn't into shooting anyone. I've been thinking for many years that the most vulnerable place for a mass shooting in US is NYC subway in a rush hour. There would be hundreds of victims... Hopefully police has considered this too.

[mmmm8]

Lucky for you all he wasn't into shooting anyone. I've been thinking for many years that the most vulnerable place for a mass shooting in US is NYC subway in a rush hour. There would be hundreds of victims... Hopefully police has considered this too.

There was a bomb attack a couple years ago in a very busy walkway inside the Times Square station during rush hour... I usually don't go through Times Square station even though my office is very close, but that morning I did because of a doctor's appointment and walked through that walkway. It was on the news while I was still in the doctor's waiting room, so I *just* missed it. Miraculously, only 1 person was injured (must have been a really badly made bomb).

[Togtdyalttai]

One more argument for the media reporting on shootings: I think that ultimately the only way we can start to minimize the number of shootings is to have stricter gun laws. Stricter gun laws are not going to happen in a vacuum. (They might not happen anyway, but that's more for the politics thread.) The media needs to inform the public so they can together pressure Congress to exact change.

[ti-amie]

Don't have to go far.... I'm two blocks from Times Square right now

Man with AK-47 assault rifle arrested in Times Square subway station
An Ohio man was busted with an AK-47 assault rifle and a gas mask inside a Times Square subway station Friday afternoon, law enforcement sources said.

The 18-year-old, whose identity was not immediately released, was taken into custody without incident around 12:30 p.m. on the mezzanine level of the subway station off the A, C and E line, the sources said.

Sources say the man was sitting down and charging his cellphone inside the station with the weapon out next to him in plain sight when a uniformed transit cop spotted him.

The AK-47 was unloaded, but the teen had a fully loaded magazine in his backpack, along with the gas mask, according to the sources.

He told police he thought carrying an unloaded rifle with the ammunition stored separately is legal in New York City, a high-ranking police source said.

https://nypost.com/2021/04/16/man-with- ... y-station/

An AK-47. And he's alive and well.

[Deuce]

It would seem you have it backwards, and mixing correlation with causation. The media covers these events because they happen, they do not happen because the media covers them.
And about history showing this: quite the opposite. The cases in Australia, Dumblane and Oslo show that AFTER an event like this one happens, IF proper laws are passed, the events cease. All three events were covered to such an extent that even a movie has been made about one of them (Oslo). Yet, they have not been repeated.

^ I don't buy that for a second.
Firstly, America is not Australia, Scotland, or Norway. American culture is a very different mindset.
Secondly, to me (and others), it is incredibly obvious that media coverage fuels these mass killings rather than helps to stifle them - for the reasons I've already stated several times. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind about this.

And so, quite obviously what has been done over the past several decades isn't working. Mass killings are forever increasing. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over, and expecting a different result.
It's time to do something different. And that something is to not report these things in the media. There is nothing to lose by taking this route, as these events have been increasing with increased media coverage, and have been well beyond terrible for a long time now.

Unless the killer is running around loose (which is quite rare), the public has no need to know about these events - except to gossip about it, and that certainly cannot be classified as a need. But this culture is addicted to gossip, sadly.
The only people who need to know are the families of the people directly involved.

One more argument for the media reporting on shootings: I think that ultimately the only way we can start to minimize the number of shootings is to have stricter gun laws. Stricter gun laws are not going to happen in a vacuum. (They might not happen anyway, but that's more for the politics thread.) The media needs to inform the public so they can together pressure Congress to exact change.

^ Once again, how has this approach worked thus far?
The facts show that this approach is not working at all in decreasing the number of mass killings. The number is consistently on the increase - and so this approach is actually helping to worsen the situation.

People need to wake up! The situation is beyond dire - it's time to try something DIFFERENT. Even if it means that we'll miss out on the fodder for gossip!

[dryrunguy]

I haven't seen it mentioned here, but I read a report last night (can't find it) stating that the mother of the Indianapolis shooter (now identified, a 19-year-old white male who could pass for Dylan Roof's twin brother) called police about a year ago to warn them her son may want to die "suicide by cop". So they interviewed him and confiscated his rifle. Months later, he legally purchased two semiautomatic weapons.

HOW ON EARTH was that possible? I don't care where someone falls on the gun rights debate, but anyone with two functioning brain cells would acknowledge that allowing this type of thing to happen is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad idea.

[ti-amie]

I haven't seen it mentioned here, but I read a report last night (can't find it) stating that the mother of the Indianapolis shooter (now identified, a 19-year-old white male who could pass for Dylan Roof's twin brother) called police about a year ago to warn them her son may want to die "suicide by cop". So they interviewed him and confiscated his rifle. Months later, he legally purchased two semiautomatic weapons.

HOW ON EARTH was that possible? I don't care where someone falls on the gun rights debate, but anyone with two functioning brain cells would acknowledge that allowing this type of thing to happen is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad idea.

Second Amendment. I wonder where he purchased the weapons?

[ti-amie]

[ti-amie]

[ponchi101]

...

People need to wake up! The situation is beyond dire - it's time to try something DIFFERENT. Even if it means that we'll miss out on the fodder for gossip!

I would expect that one thing we can agree on is that NOTHING, DIFFFERENT OR REGULAR, is being tried.
Let's grant your point. That is not being tried, and with social media and FB, Twitter and IG readily available, trying it will leave news about shootings to be dispersed via Social Media. That could lead to the conspiracy theories that are so popular in the USA.
No laws are being tried. No legislation, no registration of people that should not buy guns, nothing is being tried. Bill Maher said it on Friday: the sole thing that has been tried is "Thoughts and Prayers".
And that is not working.

[ti-amie]

[ti-amie]

[Deuce]

O say can you sob...

[ti-amie]

The reporter was Kaitlan Collins. Here's her Wiki bio.

Kaitlan L. Collins is an American journalist and Chief White House Correspondent for CNN. Previously, she was the White House correspondent for the website The Daily Caller.

[JazzNU]

Kaitlan has a decent reputation in recent years, so this is surprising. Didn't know about the Daily Caller connection though and not sure it's that well known about her. This isn't going over well for her, in the process of getting ratio'd from what I can tell.