Posts by Danyl Mclauchlan
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we start discussing the pitfalls of blogs, and means to make them work effectively (and not be time-traps or underutilised). in response to the question of "social behaviour" in and around blogs i state, "look, no one here is interested in our site becoming a kiwiblog".
cue: entire room laughing.
Try just reading DPFs entries without clicking into the threads - at that level it's actually a pretty good site with interesting links and commentary.
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No, as I said before, autistic people are no more "predisposed" to mass killing than Koreans are.
Replace the word 'autism' with 'pervasive developmental disorder' if you like: the fact remains that there are a very wide range of PDD's that affect neurological development in wildly variant ways. Most people recognize that killing other members of our species is a taboo act but it's easy to imagine how a developmental disorder could produce individuals without such an awareness.
I've no idea if that's the case - that's why I prefaced my statement with the word 'maybe', but it's certainly not impossible.
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Er ... the last one was a song about a shooting in America.
That's true, but the UK has still had a bunch of mass shootings (Dunblane, Hungerford). Virtually evrey industrialised country has. The difference between those places and the US is that everywhere else has tightened up their gun laws since their mass=shootings occured; the US continues to drift.
MAYBE some people on the autistic spectrum ARE born with a predisposition towards carrying out this kind of act? Autism activists might not like to hear it but it seems pretty reasonable to me - but with the CDC estimating that 1 in every 150 US children are autistic and no firm evidence about what causes the disorder I doubt focusing on autism is a terribly helpful way to prevent furthur tragedies.
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care to generalise why this doesn't happen with frequency in say, the United Kingdom, France, Canada, Australia, New Zealand?
The US is the largest fully industrialised country in the world by far, and anyone who can breath can own a gun - so they've got more maniacs than most places to start with and all of them have access to an unlimited amount of deadly weapons.
If the European Union had gun shows in every town then I imagine we'd see similar massacres happening there too.
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The childhood autism diagnosis was stated as a fact by the aunt, and it does actually fit the characteristics I cited.
I believe what the aunt said was that Cho suggested to her that he might be autistic.
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To expand, by suggesting that Cho had legitimate causes for his actions and that external factors were to blame makes him a victim and paves the way to making him a hero. He is neither. Take another look at his video footage in which he's posing with guns and comparing to himself as Jesus Christ - he's didn't kill all those people because of 'capitalism' or bullying - this was a University remember, not a high school - those are just transparently feeble excuses.
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yep, that'll be it Danyl. all mysteries solved.
As far as I'm concerned pontificating about how capitalism might be too blame, and your suggestion that 'maybe valuing the latest bling/car/status symbol isn't really enough to keep everyone wanting to play nice' is worthy of just as much contempt as the suggestions that Chos massacre is down to feminization of culture, or liberal values, or the academic campus environment (all arguments that have been put forward by various rightwing wingnuts over the last week).
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It appears this guy at VT was treated appallingly by many over the years
no doubt. and why?
Maybe because he was a selfish, self-obsessed psychopathic dick?
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Larkin is a great poet. Unfortunately for his reputation, his estate on his death was found to include a vast hoard of porn
That is one of my big fears in life, that I'm gonna die, you know, and my parents are gonna come to clean out my apartment, find that porno wing I've been adding onto for years. There'll be two funerals that day.
I can see my mom going through my stuff.
Look, honey, here's Bill when he was a Cub scout. Look at how cute my baby is. His little short pants, his little hat. Look how cute my baby was . . . I wonder what's in this box over here? 'Rear Entry', Volumes One through Forty?!- Bill Hicks: Dark Times
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A lawyers assistant called Liz Lawless?
And I swear I picked up the Larkin reference without the use of google, but did have to do a search to get the words right. I have to admit High Windows, and the old classic: 'They fuck you up, your Mum and Dad' are the only works of his I'm familiar with. I'm more of a Tom Elliot fan.
Wow, Danyl, you got Redbaiter off his (usually) only subject.
I have to admit I posted that link without rereading the comments thread - it does go in some pretty weird places.