<p>Yup, flossy. Though sometimes they can stretch it out with weekends and holidays. But if they don’t sign in voluntarily and nont meet commitment criteria, they get released.</p>
<p>For those posters who think he just looked like a spoiled brat, I have to wonder if the same impression would be had if people didnt know his family background or what kind of car he was driving. I watched the video. As a MH provider, I found it very disturbing. </p>
<p>Several of the victims were Asian. He wasn’t targeting a particular race, but he had an obsession with blondes. </p>
<p>@actingmt You misunderstand my point. I’m not saying that extremists = our culture. I’m saying that our culture tolerates the sort of online communities that produce extremists. And I’m also saying that the fairly extreme level of violence/hate/etc that popular mainstream culture has ramped up to lately does contribute to a certain numbness, normalcy of killing, and perhaps people going further off the deep end. it’s just like the availability of the extremist websites … being surrounded by the hyper and unreal blood, shooting, perfect plastic women, etc just isn’t a healthy thing for anyone’s psyche, let alone someone who’s possibly already cracking. I’m not saying it’s THE cause, not at all, but that it contributes. I don’t think the level of ugliness, for lack of abetter word, in popular TV/Music/video games is helping to create a better, kinder, society.</p>
<p>And, yes, it’s our culture that allows the TV/games/free access to the internet. I think we need to start examining it, talking about it, and figuring out how to get on a better track.</p>
<p>As has been discussed earlier in the thread, the Asian roommates seem to have just been collateral damage. He needed them gone before he could execute his plan focusing on the pretty blondes (and the guys they are attracted to). It’s sad that they are not receiving much attention in the press, but perhaps their families don’t want it. Heartbreaking.</p>
<p>Cultural icons: the Wild West, Wyatt Earp, Billy the Kid, Jesse James, Shane, The Magnificent Seven, Clint Eastwood movies, The Wild Bunch, Charles Whitman, Rambo, Klebold and Harris, Adam Lanza and on and on. The loner or outlaw with a gun is mythologized. We all imbibed it as children. Back in the day, one might argue that it was relatively benign (Shane). Over time, it morphed into something much more pernicious. Adam Lanza expressed a desire to score a higher body count than his rivals. </p>
<p>Anyone who doesn’t see this as an ongoing thread in our culture is, well, blind.</p>
<p>The target was the sorority. Everyone else was collateral damage because no-one answered the door at the sorority house. It was all Plan B and not racial. Actually, it’s striking and a little sad that people are counting how many of this or that group he killed. He didn’t care.</p>
<p>No, no, no! This wasn’t a big deal because it was a “random attack against white people”. </p>
<p>This was a hate crime. A crime that had been sitting in the mind of this man’s for awhile. </p>
<p>This was a mass killing with a mental heath component. Gang shootings are a big issue (or they should be), but a different issue entirely.</p>
<p>^^^Agree. Is there some relevance to the fact that the initial victims names were Wang, Hong and Chen? I don’t think so. If their names had been Magillicuddy, Cavanaugh and O’Reilly it doesn’t impact my view of the horror of the murders. Did I miss some unreported angle in the story?</p>
<p>No. How this became racial is a mystery, unless people are extrapolating from the fact that he was angry about not having a girlfriend and preferred a blonde. But, that is quite a reach. Also, I have no clue what Adam Lanza and the Columbine killers are doing on a list of cultural icons along with some old movies and TV shows that is doubtful this kid has ever even seen. The Hunger Games is about teens killing teens and it may be slightly more relevant to this case.</p>
<p>How is this crime different than a gangbanger’s hate-filling murder of a member if a rival gang? I AM NOT SAYING IT IS OR ISN’T. Rather, i’m very interested in that analysis, and do not know how I see it myself. I’m trying to understand by lilistening. Maybe there’s a difference between sociopathic and anti-social behavior? </p>
<p>How is this crime different than a gangbanger’s hate-filling murder of a member if a rival gang? I AM NOT SAYING IT IS OR ISN’T. Rather, i’m very interested in that analysis, and do not know how I see it myself. I’m trying to understand by listening. Maybe there’s a difference between sociopathic and anti-social behavior? </p>
<p>Stacey - Thanks for clarifying. It’s true, our culture does tolerate the internet and kooks find things to feed their obsessions. His Hollywood upbringing is also notoriously unhealthy. </p>
<p>How is this crime different than a gangbanger’s hate-filling murder of a member if a rival gang? I AM NOT SAYING IT IS OR ISN’T. Rather, i’m very interested in that analysis, and do not know how I see it myself. I’m trying to understand by lilistening. Maybe there’s a difference between sociopathic and anti-social behavior? </p>
<p>It’s not racial. Nobody missed any news angle. I was posting in response to another post taking that angle on it in hopes of dispelling that idea. I don’t see the point in that other than to create more hard feelings between people, and we don’t need that.</p>
<p>This is a terrible, senseless, and tragic loss for the victims and their families. </p>
<p>Not sure if the “cultural” argument being made is positing that the behavior of this perpetrator is something new, but I vividly recall the Son of Sam serial killer during my own college days in the 70s, and he was purportedly targeting women and couples back then too.</p>
<p>My personal take on what happened/is happening with these college-aged killers is that their actions are spurred by their developmental age. My understanding is that mental illness during the early 20s is quite common; I thought two of my own college-aged children went a little “crazy” during that time: one with anxiety and the other with depression, both to the point where they sought help from campus resources. </p>
<p>This particular young man had a complex history of issues, so perhaps that is what made his “crazy college-age” behavior so extreme (like Adam Lanza). Both of my kids exhibited similar issues to their craziness when they were growing up, but nothing at all extreme. I look back at their early behavior as a precursor. </p>
<p>There are probably innumerable young men who are angry and lonely and resentful about their sex/social lives at age 22. Perhaps figuring out why most don’t go to the extreme of killing over it, but this one and several others did, is key. </p>
<p>As far as prevention goes, I’m thinking about the “bystander” solution to bullying. Maybe encouraging peer outsiders to observe and take action with interventionist type measures when they see these “odd” people might help, but I’m not sure how that would work yet. Just a thought.</p>
<p>" Maybe there’s a difference between sociopathic and anti-social behavior?"</p>
<p>Yes. And, the mental break with reality. Killing random people for no reason or an imaginary reason seems different to me than a drug deal gone bad or a gangland turf battle. These mass murderers are usually crazy. Gang bangers are not.</p>
<p>I agree, gang bangers have a lot in common with members of other gangs.
They live a violent life, but I dont believe they see themselves as intrinsically different from a member of a rnival gang.</p>
<p>Psychopaths seem themselves as apart.</p>
<p>I also want to mention that Ive known two kids who were bullied that stand out.
I want to make it clear that Im not condoning bullying.
However what I observed is that both individuals provoked it.
Even when others in their group were trying to be inclusive, the kids who were bullied reacted inappropriately.
It reminded me of the saying " negative attention, is better than no attention at all".
Something about their personalities really provoked others.
One kid had been a foster kid, and was adopted by parents who were both child psychologists,so its likely she just had a lot of issues to work through.
The other was an only child of well educated & successful parents, and he appeared to have been born with a chip on his shoulder.</p>
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<p>The word “provoked” suggests that the annoying, unpleasant children deserved to be bullied, or that they intended to be bullied because they wanted attention. But nobody deserves to be bullied, even annoying, unpleasant children. Moreover, I think it’s unlikely that the unpleasant children behaved unpleasantly in order to be abused. It can look that way to outsiders, who say to themselves, “That kid is asking for it, behaving that way,” but if you look at it from the eyes of the unpleasant kid, they did not intend to ask to be bullied. They might want attention, but they don’t want violent or abusive attention, at least in most cases.</p>
<p>No-one thinks bullying is okay. Bullying does not leaf to mass murder. Being nicer to creeps will not prevent mass murder. This kid was creepy and it’s not at all surprising he couldn’t get a date</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/california-shooting-elliot-rodgers-bitter-3607840”>http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/california-shooting-elliot-rodgers-bitter-3607840</a></p>