Batman massacre: People killed at Dark Knight premiere

[Sammich]

We know he was a random loon... We know there's no real risk in going to the cinema or indeed even this specific film. So please so these stupid flag waving articles! It is another example of tragedies being exploited for private financial gain that ranks up there with the "they hate us for our freedoms" and "freedom fries" bullshit. Are the theaters and movie studios going to be offered bailouts also? Give me a damn break.

[rgc2005]

You can't just buy tear gas grenades, or military grade smokers. You can still get smokers through other means, but surplus stores don't sell them and to order them out of a catalog or online you have to show proof that you're a law enforcement officer or active military. Most catalogs and online shops restrict ballistic vests like that also. This is due to that bank robbery in CA where the 2 guys wore them and the police didn't have sufficient weapons to deal with them at the time. I beg to differ on this point. Go to the next gun show advertised in your area. You will find booths full of the stuff. Old/Used vests, CS/Smoke grenades, helmets, etc.... The military surplus industry is very much alive, legal and doing quite well.

[SymphonicX]

Here's an interesting article: http://theweek.com/article/index/230...rises-massacre 3. Blame it on the ongoing attack on Christian values Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) tried to score a conservative twofer, says Jennifer Bendery at The Huffington Post. First, he suggested that a "senseless crazy act of terror like this" is somehow linked to the "ongoing attacks on Judeo-Christian beliefs" in modern America. People try to push God out of the public square, Gohmert says, but such shootings show how much we need his "protective hand." Then he put in a plug for concealed weapons. "It does make me wonder, with all those people in the theater, was there nobody that was carrying a gun that could have stopped this guy more quickly?" -- -------- Post added at 11:53 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:24 AM ---------- Apparently, the US's gun crime rates are 8 times higher than any western country with similar gun laws. So the issue here IS NOT gun ownership, in my eyes!! An important point - one that helps both sides move on from the answer to this problem being percieved as tighter gun control. The issue here is SOCIETY... I can see a few issues: 1) You live in constant fear of a totalitarian regime/communism/terrorism/ 2) You live in a society that purports two conflicting messages: We are an independent nation of non-conformists who are one nation, under God....erm... 3) MEDIA. No one brings it up. Biased media, partial media - whatever you want to call it. News should NOT have a political agenda (if anywhere, the newspapers) - all sorts of corrupt shit happens. Your media is based on fear, terror, fear, pain, prevention of fear, more fear, and a tad of passive aggressive racism. All sorts of junk food for the brain on your tellies - a massively sexualised advertising industry that's psychologically honed to make you feel as shitty as possible in the shortest amount of time. 4) Nationalism. "You're either with us, or against us. Probably against us." 5) Religion and it's over bearing expectations that cross the line from absurd into complete and utter madness. What these illustrate though isn't the cause of gun crime, or the cause of a nujob like Holmes doing what he's doing... ...but it's the fear generated by these things that cause you to stop talking to each other, to stop identifying these problems in people and providing community support structure. Instead the fear instilled into you by these organisations or thought-processes cause you to stop communicating, draw yourselves into a bubble, and look after your immediate loved ones and yourself - hence the fear of a need to own a fully equipped array of weapons.

[Neil]

^^ This is all a very interesting topic. I don't know what the answer in the US is. Gun ownership is so instilled culturally there would have to be a huge shift in mindset for people to be willing to lose guns, and indeed it would take a generation or two to even achieve it. And indeed, guns isn't just the sole answer either, as there's a huge cultural reason why there's so many gun deaths in the US, while other countries - with similar gun laws - have fewer deaths. Just don't know what the answer is...

[Mike70]

The issue here is SOCIETY... I can see a few issues: 1) You live in constant fear of a totalitarian regime/communism/terrorism/ 2) You live in a society that purports two conflicting messages: We are an independent nation of non-conformists who are one nation, under God....erm... 3) MEDIA. No one brings it up. Biased media, partial media - whatever you want to call it. News should NOT have a political agenda (if anywhere, the newspapers) - all sorts of corrupt shit happens. Your media is based on fear, terror, fear, pain, prevention of fear, more fear, and a tad of passive aggressive racism. All sorts of junk food for the brain on your tellies - a massively sexualised advertising industry that's psychologically honed to make you feel as shitty as possible in the shortest amount of time. 4) Nationalism. "You're either with us, or against us. Probably against us." 5) Religion and it's over bearing expectations that cross the line from absurd into complete and utter madness. What these illustrate though isn't the cause of gun crime, or the cause of a nujob like Holmes doing what he's doing... ...but it's the fear generated by these things that cause you to stop talking to each other, to stop identifying these problems in people and providing community support structure. Instead the fear instilled into you by these organisations or thought-processes cause you to stop communicating, draw yourselves into a bubble, and look after your immediate loved ones and yourself - hence the fear of a need to own a fully equipped array of weapons. you know NOTHING of America or Americans other than what you see on TV, yet you have the stones to dare lay out some 5 point plan as to why Americans are the way they are? please. you are just as guilty of slurping up what the media tells as you as the people you accuse. you have always struck me as someone with more wind in their mouth than brainpower in their head and now you have proved it once and for all. the issue here isn't guns at all. it is why people feel the need to murder large numbers of people at once and lash out in these sorts of ways. it goes on everywhere. mass murders, whether they happen by gun, by bomb, or by poison gas, happen all over the globe. I'm an atheist who does not watch any sort of visual news media, lumping every American into "manipulated by the media" camp is horrifically simplistic and utterly stupid. that list of yours is full of meaningless labels and hot button words folks like to throw around because it de facto invalidates the opinion of the person on the other side of the label. in my opinion, everyone ought to live in fear of totalitarianism and dictators. it is because people get too comfortable or too lazy that these kinds of govts. arise. i agree with bassman on this one: it is rather f*cking sick that folks like you have chosen to take an event like this as yet another opportunity to climb up on your moral high horse in order to air out political ideas/agendas like a bunch of stale farts. there are enough knee-jerk reactions in the world and absolutely nothing good comes out them. i'm not making a knee jerk reaction. i'm finally doing something i've been meaning to do for a long time: put you on my ignore list so i don't have to insult my brain with anymore of your bullshit. -- -------- Post added at 10:04 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:52 AM ---------- So a thread about an undeniable tragedy has turned into a political debate? This is the world we live in, I suppose. I really shouldn't be surprised. Certain people should be ashamed of themselves. i'll totally f*cking agree with you, bassman. a lot of the british members of this forum have gone way out of line by pretending that they somehow understand america/americans and are making complete f*cking asses of themselves in the process. next time a suicide bomb goes off somewhere i'm gonna turn the thread into a debate on banning fertilizer because it is so easy to make into a bomb.

[Neil]

^^ hey hey! Let's all take a step back shall we... As a Brit I'm happy with the gun laws we have over here in the UK, and realise there's no way they'd work over in the US where the view on weapons and their ownership is very different to the UK etc etc... The US clearly has a lot of gun related deaths, but I really just don't know what the answer is to help that. Anyway, on a side note, how is the media handling the death of the six year old? Why on earth was a six year old even in that film, that late? I know I wouldn't take a six year old girl to it!?

[bassman]

Warner Brothers is going into crisis management mode. Several networks have stopped airing TV spots for TDKR and now WB is pulling all trailers for their upcoming film, Gangster Squad, which features a gang shooting through a screen and into a crowded theater(trailer below). I can understand pulling the prints and editing out that scene from the trailers, but they're also saying that they're going to edit the scene out from the actual movie?? I can't imagine what those people in Colorado are going through, but changing what is said to be a crucial moment in a film that was completed long before this tragedy? At least prolong the release of the film rather than editing out important scenes! What's next......a complete third act edit to Inglorious Basterds? Anyway, on a side note, how is the media handling the death of the six year old? Why on earth was a six year old even in that film, that late? I know I wouldn't take a six year old girl to it!? Exactly my thoughts on it. Whether or not the child is old enough to handle the PG13 Batman films is debatable from parent-to-parent, but to be at a 12:01 AM screening? WTF is that about? What's even worse is that the six year old wasn't even the youngest child there! One couple brought a FOUR MONTH OLD BABY. When the shooting began, the father actually abandoned his children and left the theater without his family. A 19 year old boy who was uninjured and almost out the door saw the mother frantically trying to protect her baby and went back to save them, gaining bullet wounds in the process. The mother still plans to marry the baby's father. WTF?????

[Danny]

Warner Brothers is going into crisis management mode. Several networks have stopped airing TV spots for TDKR and now WB is pulling all trailers for their upcoming film, Gangster Squad, which features a gang shooting through a screen and into a crowded theater(trailer below). I can understand pulling the prints and editing out that scene from the trailers, but they're also saying that they're going to edit the scene out from the actual movie?? I can't imagine what those people in Colorado are going through, but changing what is said to be a crucial moment in a film that was completed long before this tragedy? At least prolong the release of the film rather than editing out important scenes! What's next......a complete third act edit to Inglorious Basterds? kind of reminds me when they cut the twin towers out of a spiderman trailer and shopped it out of the movie, at a certain point art always imitates life even unintentionally. its just the randomness of life and art imitating it. short of something like saw a lot of stuff that happens to unfortunate people in films has happened to people in real life too. In cases like these though it just shows folks are far more eager to sweep it under the rug in precaution to escape possible blame and finger pointing than find the root of problems these days. Which in this case wasnt a gun control problem, the guy just happened to live in a country where that was a convenient venue, the problem is people dont give a fuck anymore and whenever someone goes 'psycho' its always "he seemed wierd" after the fact. People like this shooter are disturbed, had someone noticed and given them aid for their ailing mental health before this would never have happened. Thats nothing to do with america, or gun control, its a universal constant for people. our mental health is our last bastion of supposed impenetrable stability and anythign else means 'being crazy' so people view needing mental health care as something shameful and the ultimate failure. Society as a whole needs to better look after its mental wellbeing so people like this can be noticed earlier and given the help someone so disturbed clearly needed way before it got to this.

[LouCipherr]

kind of reminds me when they cut the twin towers out of a spiderman trailer and shopped it out of the movie, at a certain point art always imitates life even unintentionally. Yup. It was a bitch move then, and it's a bitch move now with Gangster Squad. If you can't handle the content of the movie, don't go see it. It's pretty fucking simple. These people should not have to alter their films because something happened between when it was made and when it was released that was beyond their control. Political correctness once again ruins everything.

[SymphonicX]

you know NOTHING of America or Americans other than what you see on TV, yet you have the stones to dare lay out some 5 point plan as to why Americans are the way they are? please. you are just as guilty of slurping up what the media tells as you as the people you accuse. you have always struck me as someone with more wind in their mouth than brainpower in their head and now you have proved it once and for all. the issue here isn't guns at all. it is why people feel the need to murder large numbers of people at once and lash out in these sorts of ways. it goes on everywhere. mass murders, whether they happen by gun, by bomb, or by poison gas, happen all over the globe. I'm an atheist who does not watch any sort of visual news media, lumping every American into "manipulated by the media" camp is horrifically simplistic and utterly stupid. that list of yours is full of meaningless labels and hot button words folks like to throw around because it de facto invalidates the opinion of the person on the other side of the label. in my opinion, everyone ought to live in fear of totalitarianism and dictators. it is because people get too comfortable or too lazy that these kinds of govts. arise. i agree with bassman on this one: it is rather f*cking sick that folks like you have chosen to take an event like this as yet another opportunity to climb up on your moral high horse in order to air out political ideas/agendas like a bunch of stale farts. there are enough knee-jerk reactions in the world and absolutely nothing good comes out them. i'm not making a knee jerk reaction. i'm finally doing something i've been meaning to do for a long time: put you on my ignore list so i don't have to insult my brain with anymore of your bullshit.[COLOR="Silver"] -- -------- Post added at 10:04 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:52 AM ---------- . In previous thread I basically agreed with what most of your post said by saying something fairly similar. "the issue here isn't guns at all. it is why people feel the need to murder large numbers of people at once and lash out in these sorts of ways. " That's what I'm saying. Exactly what I'm saying. I'm throwing up a few things that look a bit obvious to me. It's just because I'm not American that you're getting all prissy and high-horsey about it. I'm not politicising it whatsoever - politicising it would be to talk about gun control - which I'm saying this is a subsidary argument to the real issue. You've already just agreed with that... You know I've gotta add that it's really so so rubbish to feel as though I have to provide a contrasting and equivalant point about the UK every time I level a criticism against America. America aint perfect, and by the UK is so fuckin' not perfect - the bottom line is America is the most powerful nation in the world - when it sneezes, the world catches a cold. OF COURSE everyone's gonna have an opinion about how you do things. Just like many people have opinions on how Iran does things, or Syria, or Japan. Providing an outside viewpoint does NOT make someone so hideously against a country that they are just trying to take cheap shots. Christ. If you've got me on ignore, good for you. I've not ignored a single member of this board and their opinion, no matter how I might disagree, is deserving of that sort of childish reaction.

[shootemindehead]

Anyway, on a side note, how is the media handling the death of the six year old? Why on earth was a six year old even in that film, that late? I know I wouldn't take a six year old girl to it!? [URL="http://www.variety.com/article/VR1118056910"]Exactly my thoughts on it. Whether or not the child is old enough to handle the PG13 Batman films is debatable from parent-to-parent, but to be at a 12:01 AM screening? WTF is that about? I honestly think that the fact that a mentally disturbed man can go into a gun shop(s) and tool up with a personal arsenal of two handguns, a pump action shotgun, a semi-auto assault rifle, 6000 rounds of ammo, a helmet and a suit of body armour with the most appalling ease, trumps any WTF that someone might have at bringing a 6 year old to a midnight Batman film.

[childofgilead]

What I'd like some of our UK friends to understand is that there are some of us who enjoy your culture and ideals very much. I love watching the rare programs you export this way, I'm currentlymaking my way through the whole run of Top Gear on Netflix for the third time as I type this. However, the points I'm about to raise are going to ruffle feathers on both sides of the Atlantic. If American culture is only stagnating and not on the decline I would be extremely surprised. We're obsessed with "reality" programs, doesn't even matter what it is, if it's a multi-cam set up with arguments going on, people apparently feel a compulsion to watch. Personally, I think it's trash. I don't care if it's the Kardashians or Red Jacket gunmakers, it's all shit. We hold fame as an ideal to achieve, doesn't matter how or why, but so many just want to be famous. Case in point, Mr Sean Penn in that movie clip above. Asshole loves to tell people how their lives should be run, sides with the left side on any and all issues, yet stars in films with violence. But this isn't seen as hypocritical, because he votes the way that's acceptable by Hollywood standards. Doesn't matter that he's a waste of humanity, doesn't matter that he and his ilk like Alec Baldwin abuse photogs and reporters, they're higher up, better than the common man because they can afford someone to protect them when the police can't. And let me tell you a secret. The police CAN'T protect the average citizen. I've experienced it too many times in my personal life. I've lost close family friends to gun violence. But it was a madman who pulled the trigger. The police, when called arrived minutes after he'd placed the gun in his own mouth, after killing his son and wife and grievously wounding his daughter, and squeezed the trigger, blasting his sick, depraved brains all over his ceiling. He was always giving off a vibe of an abusive husband and father. The police had been called several times and nothing could ever be done. Then, on that day, he walked straight into his home and began shooting. No warning, no chance to protect themselves. Now, some may be assuming that I believe that if his wife had access to a gun everything could have been different. In this situation, I don't see how anything could have changed. There simply was no warning, no chance at all for her to escape or fight back. So yes, I believe the mental health "industry" in this country needs a serious overhaul. I've worked in this field for several years now and I can tell you from flat out experience, if a paranoid schizophrenic wants to kill you they don't need a handgun. They'll use an ink pen for instance. Or their fingers, into your eyeballs. Their teeth can be used to tear open your throat or in the joint of your elbow and your arm is useless because of the nerve damage and bloodloss. On every time I've had to use a restraint or physical force to subdue a patient, I've come away in borderline shock, adrenaline pounding through my veins, shivering in anger and fear. Going up against someone who can go from sane to something else in the literal blink of an eye is always a traumatic experience. Take it from me, if I had a hopped up meth head coming at me in the parking lot at night after work, I'd much rather have my .45 on my hip than in my console or at home. It's not a get out of death free card, but against someone who is almost inhumanely strong due to mental defect, it's sometimes the only advantage a normal person will have. We also have a huge gang problem in my country. We've prided ourselves on being a melting pot for many generations, but so many people who make the trip over aren't interested in assimilating into a new culture and just want the presumed opportunities this place offers, without making the next step and actually becoming an citizen. This is why the gang problem has spread from the larger cities out into the suburbs, even into the small areas where I reside. Drugs are a cancer to this area, it's a pipeline, straight from Charlotte, North Carolina into Washington, D.C., Baltimore, Philadelphia and New York City. Meth is manufactured in the old mining towns and distributed by poor white trash into the urban areas, where it's either cut and sold on the street or shipped further up the road. Several years ago, a kid I went to high school with got into some trouble with the law. However, since he was highly regarded, since his family came from money and since the girl he killed in the drug fueled car accident wasn't highly thought of, it was all hushed up. When the sheriff who swept this and many many other things under the carpet got caught taking bribes from a meth distributor, he was fired, WITH pension, pending an investigation. That was four years ago. Now, what does all this have to do with gun violence? Honestly, even I don't know anymore. If you feel that firearms really are that repugnant, you should let it be known to everyone. Why not make a big sign and place it outside your home, on your lawn. "I do not own a gun." Such a short sentence. If you believe in your convictions so highly to be able to tell ME that I don't have the right to make the choice for myself, why not let the entire world know? Each and every person that drives or walks or slinks past the home where you sleep at night. They should all be able to see how devoted to human rights you consider yourself to be. C'mon, do it! Let everyone know!

[shootemindehead]

He was always giving off a vibe of an abusive husband and father. The police had been called several times and nothing could ever be done. Then, on that day, he walked straight into his home and began shooting. No warning, no chance to protect themselves. Now, some may be assuming that I believe that if his wife had access to a gun everything could have been different. In this situation, I don't see how anything could have changed. There simply was no warning, no chance at all for her to escape or fight back. I've bolded the important words in your sentence above. You see, I believe that weapons shouldn't be available to just anyone and it's far too easy to buy the most ridiculous type of weaponry in the States at the moment. I think that this situation NEEDS to be tightened up. Somebody who has exhibited the above traits and has been the subject of police action SHOULD NOT be allowed near weapons at all and if they possess them, they should be taken off of them.

[babomb]

Here's an interesting article: http://theweek.com/article/index/230...rises-massacre -- -------- Post added at 11:53 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:24 AM ---------- Apparently, the US's gun crime rates are 8 times higher than any western country with similar gun laws. So the issue here IS NOT gun ownership, in my eyes!! An important point - one that helps both sides move on from the answer to this problem being percieved as tighter gun control. The issue here is SOCIETY... I can see a few issues: 1) You live in constant fear of a totalitarian regime/communism/terrorism/ 2) You live in a society that purports two conflicting messages: We are an independent nation of non-conformists who are one nation, under God....erm... 3) MEDIA. No one brings it up. Biased media, partial media - whatever you want to call it. News should NOT have a political agenda (if anywhere, the newspapers) - all sorts of corrupt shit happens. Your media is based on fear, terror, fear, pain, prevention of fear, more fear, and a tad of passive aggressive racism. All sorts of junk food for the brain on your tellies - a massively sexualised advertising industry that's psychologically honed to make you feel as shitty as possible in the shortest amount of time. 4) Nationalism. "You're either with us, or against us. Probably against us." 5) Religion and it's over bearing expectations that cross the line from absurd into complete and utter madness. What these illustrate though isn't the cause of gun crime, or the cause of a nujob like Holmes doing what he's doing... ...but it's the fear generated by these things that cause you to stop talking to each other, to stop identifying these problems in people and providing community support structure. Instead the fear instilled into you by these organisations or thought-processes cause you to stop communicating, draw yourselves into a bubble, and look after your immediate loved ones and yourself - hence the fear of a need to own a fully equipped array of weapons. I have to agree with this. I personally don't take offense to observations made by people from other countries. I think that people from other countries can provide a wider perspective on our society because they aren't caught up in it. It comes down to the fact that we as a nation and society worship money. That's why our media has a political agenda. Because our media is owned by huge corporations that push those political agendas in order to appeal to a certain demographic. They try very hard to stay in good graces with the companies that advertise on their stations. They push the political agenda of the people that control those companies. They push fear like a drug dealer pushing his product. Because fear is a major component of controlling the US population. You can get people to do almost anything, to accept almost anything if you speak to their fears. Fear is demoralizing, for many people it's paralyzing. The US is in the throws of a war on it's people. The war on terror, the war on drugs, the war on poverty, the war on guns. All these "wars" equate to a war on the people. The point of these wars is not to win them either. It's to protract them in order to harvest the fruits they continually bring in. Which boils down to wealth and greed. Politicians and corporations exploit the way our system is designed to maximize profit and control over future profit. They're the 1%, so they have ALL the money. Wealth brings power. So they use that power to psychologically dominate the population. To restrict peoples options to only the ones they provide and control. And they do it in a way that makes you think that you actually made that choice yourself. Religion does the same thing. Restricts your options to only those that are beneficial to the controlling interest. In other words, it means control over you individually, which in the larger picture means control over everyone. America is used as a platform to exert control over the global population. That's what all the wars abroad are about. Resources. But they mask it through propaganda. They try to make us believe shit like that the Iraq war was about liberating the people from an evil dictator and preventing them from acquiring nuclear weapons. Or the war in Afghanistan is about liberating women and routing out Al-Queada. Whatever happened to Al-Quaeda anyway? You don't hear much about them anymore. Are we supposed to believe that since Bin Laden was killed they've been eradicated? Please... Now the big thing is Iran and Syria's nuclear program. So we must act to protect Israel. This has become an all out police state. And it's not about the security of the people, it's about control of the people. IMO, this nation shouldn't even be called America anymore. It's not America. I'm not sure what it is anymore but I know it's not America. -- -------- Post added at 11:12 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:50 PM ---------- kind of reminds me when they cut the twin towers out of a spiderman trailer and shopped it out of the movie, at a certain point art always imitates life even unintentionally. its just the randomness of life and art imitating it. short of something like saw a lot of stuff that happens to unfortunate people in films has happened to people in real life too. In cases like these though it just shows folks are far more eager to sweep it under the rug in precaution to escape possible blame and finger pointing than find the root of problems these days. Which in this case wasnt a gun control problem, the guy just happened to live in a country where that was a convenient venue, the problem is people dont give a fuck anymore and whenever someone goes 'psycho' its always "he seemed wierd" after the fact. People like this shooter are disturbed, had someone noticed and given them aid for their ailing mental health before this would never have happened. Thats nothing to do with america, or gun control, its a universal constant for people. our mental health is our last bastion of supposed impenetrable stability and anythign else means 'being crazy' so people view needing mental health care as something shameful and the ultimate failure. Society as a whole needs to better look after its mental wellbeing so people like this can be noticed earlier and given the help someone so disturbed clearly needed way before it got to this. While i agree with the points you're making I just want to point out a couple problems with this as a practical measure. How could anyone have gotten him mental help? You can't go around court ordering random people to undergo mental health evaluation. He would've had to break a law or exhibit behavior that makes him a direct threat to himself and/or others. Just being strange isn't grounds for intervention by anyone except your family or close friends. And even then, the person can't be forced to cooperate. Something like that has too much potential for abuse and would not be economically practical. The state would end up footing the bill for all this. You'd have people getting forced into treatment for stupid shit. Like families staging interventions on their kids just for being rebellious or because they don't agree with the choices the kids are making on things. Then you have the added burden of maintaining prolongued treatment for conditions that may or may not even exist. Therapy is expensive, so are the prescription drugs that would inevitably be the basis of the treatment program. What you're saying is basically a preemptive measure against people who just stray from the "norm". And who gets to decide what the "norm" is? This would end up being exploited for political and monetary gain, just like everything else. It's an erosion of freedom. 1 thing this whole thread is teaching me is that there are ALOT of people willing to trade liberty for safety. Which is exactly the reaction they're trying to create. There's a term for this now. It's called "Disaster Capitalism". It's when a disaster or harmful event is exploited for political and monetary gain. Because at this very moment, when Obama's approval rating is dithering, and an incident like this shooting occurs, they can introduce legislature for gun control with Obama's endorsement. Which will effectively guarantee his re-election. I also don't think legislation should be born of raw emotion. Laws should be made using logic, not by the galvanization of people after a violent event.

[rgc2005]

I work part time at a bookstore. Today corporate ordered us to take down this week's issue of "Entertainment Weekly".