"An eighth-grade language arts teacher from Maryland has been placed on administrative leave after school officials learned he allegedly authored two books containing questionable content under a pseudonym.
Local network WBOC News reports that the investigation concerns two books published by McLaw under the nom de plume “Dr. K.S. Voltaer,” and one is about a fictional, futuristic school shooting that goes down in history as being the largest ever in the United States.
http://rt.com/usa/182964-teacher-leave-shooting-book/"
This is lunacy. School administrators are terrified there will be another Columbine or Sandy Hook and are overreacting, or are they. What could they do to prevent one. Nothing, nil, zero. No need to ask yourself 'why', say thank you to the traitorous NRA , the propaganda arm of the small arms manufacturing industry, for blocking any form of gun control. They have successfully infected the country with The American Disease™ almost unfettered access to weapons of war that kill with brutal efficiency. Sadly there appears to be no cure.
[EDITOR'S NOTE: The preceding paragraph was not up to our standards. The comments to this story are spot on. You expect better than this and we let you down. There are so many comments referring to this paragraph, we cannot just delete it, hence the strike-through. More to follow.]
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @10:31AM
the ranting and name-calling in their so-called "articles"
Even if the original story has merit (and it does) respectable journalism sources simply don't behave this way. You wonder why nobody takes this site seriously?
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Kell on Saturday August 30 2014, @10:51AM
I rather agree - if SN is to go from a site run by people passionate about community driven news, they need to actually apply a bit of care in crafting TFS. We all railed against the green site's lazy summary writing. We should aspire to better.
Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Kell on Sunday August 31 2014, @02:13AM
And hey - here's SN changing TFS and apologising for dropping the ball. This sort of responsiveness to the readers and willingness to listen is what makes SN great. Good stuff, Soylent!
Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by romlok on Saturday August 30 2014, @11:11AM
Yes, less editorialising and political ranting in the summaries, please.
The content and tone of the summaries of the site are the face of Soylent News, and if this kind of ranting is what SN wants as their public persona, then I don't think I would want to patronise this site any more.
If the submitter really wants to make a case for their personal political stance, coherent or not, then let them do it in the article comments like the rest of us.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday August 30 2014, @10:05PM
I had a hearty laugh reading that summary, and wondered if it was April Fool's day. Was the submitter serious? How could they have submitted that with a straight face? They must have been trolling. Thank you Soylent News for making my day, heeheehawhaw!
And the comments certainly didn't disappoint either, like the one on downward that says something like "Hey Hippie, shut the fuck up with your pacification bullshit!" And I agree, those filthy hippies should get a haircut and a goddamn job instead of wallowing in pot and incense smoke and being stinky degenerates.
That being said, I think that submitters should be allowed to editorialize as long as they make it clear that certain blocks of text are just, like, their opinion, man.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by mcgrew on Sunday August 31 2014, @02:19PM
They must have been trolling.
You should know if anybody does.
those filthy hippies should get a haircut...
Why?
...and a goddamn job instead of wallowing in pot and incense smoke and being stinky degenerates.
I'll have you know, Mister Troll, that I've been smoking pot for forty years, had long hair most of that time, and worked from when I was sixteen until I retired this year. How your offtopic insults got modded insightful rather than flamebait I can't fathom. Maybe someone misread it as "insultful".
I think that submitters should be allowed to editorialize
Not in the summary. The summary is for information, editorializing belongs strictly in the comments.
Oh, kudos to s/n staff for actions after this blunder. I doubt they'll repeat the mistake.
Impeach Donald Saruman and his sidekick Elon Sauron
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Sunday August 31 2014, @05:03PM
Maybe they are in financial trouble? [wikipedia.org]
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Leebert on Saturday August 30 2014, @11:25AM
Indeed. I was happy to see that SN was finally selling subscriptions, and it was on my "to do" list this weekend. Now I'm second guessing that...
(Score: 2) by Marand on Sunday August 31 2014, @10:53AM
Looks like someone's going through marking everything about the poor submission as "offtopic" -- I got hit by one and a bunch of other comments have been downmodded including yours. Not really off-topic to be discussing the submission itself, in my opinion, but whatever. I'm guessing SpockLogic just got some mod points today is all.
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Sunday August 31 2014, @02:41PM
Looks like someone's going through marking everything about the poor submission as "offtopic"
They are offtopic, including mine, and if they're modded down I won't complain. The topic is overbearing idiocy in our schools, not the summary.
However, that summary begged for a deluge of offtopic comments.
As to Spocklogic, he must be the most misnamed person here, because his anti-gun rant was completely illogical and irrational and completely a knee-jerk emotional response, the opposite of a Vulcan. Look at Chicago and New York City, two places with the roughest anti-gun laws, but with gun deaths almost daily.
The failure of alcohol and drug prohibitions is proof that anti-gun laws won't work. Guns are not hard to construct, prisoners have made guns while incarcarated! Outlawing a thing does not get it off the streets.
That said, I own no firearms. Everyone dies but no one has to kill.
Logic dictates that the laws should target guns used in crimes, and the people who use them. Felons lose their right to bear arms, as they should. What you want is Minority Report. That was a fantasy, as there are no people like the ones in the tank.
Impeach Donald Saruman and his sidekick Elon Sauron
(Score: 2) by Marand on Sunday August 31 2014, @09:21PM
I just think the summary is part of the relevant discussion, so if it's off-topic borderline-insane ranting, then discussion of that is fair game as well. Otherwise there'd be no point in allowing a summary at all. I elaborate on that in my reply to janrinok, so no point repeating it all here.
Same. I have no desire to own one, but I have no problem with others wishing to, or enjoying their use, and support keeping firearms legal because the tool isn't the problem, it's how a minority of people use them.
It's the same logic as the "I don't agree what you say but I'll defend your right to say it" idea, which I also adhere to, and is relevant to the story itself: even if someone disagrees with the subject matter of the book, they should be able to accept its existence and let it go. Books should not be criminal, because down that road is thought crime. Next up we'll have people incarcerated because Big Data knows you bought candy off Amazon and you looked up where day cares in your town are. The algorithms decided that means the person's a potential pedo, so better toss them in a prison just in case.
Precisely. A firearm is a tool, just like any number of other tools. Chainsaws are dangerous but as far as I know not illegal to own, as well as knives. You can create malware with a compiler, but that doesn't mean compilers should be banned. Some people argue that firearms are different because their primary purpose is offensive in nature, but that's not a feature unique to guns. If you're going that route, you'll have to start outlawing chemistry, too, but I don't see anybody arguing for that.
Better to bust the people that do the horrible things and restrict their future access to the tools based on prior misbehaviour. There's some inherent risk involved, but it's less dangerous than stripping freedom from everybody, piece by piece, because "it's for your own good, we promise", in my opinion.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Sunday August 31 2014, @02:47PM
I think that you already know, but in case others do not, if you set the threshold value to -1 you can read every comment.
The moderation is not being done by SN staff - but as the offending paragraph was irrelevant to the main story, it does not seem unreasonable that the comments about that paragraph are now being modded as 'Off Topic', particularly as we have indicated that it should be ignored and it has been 'deleted'. The discussion of the teacher being banned is most certainly of interest to many of the community.
I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
(Score: 2) by Marand on Sunday August 31 2014, @08:58PM
I wasn't implying that staff was doing the modding, unless SpockLogic is staff and I wasn't aware. (God, I'd hope not, considering.) Also, thanks for the threshold tip, but you're right about me being aware already: I've got it set to -1 thresthold and 0 breakthrough so that ACs with good comments get seen, and I can fix bad moderation in the rare situation where it knocks someone to -1 undeservedly. I know a lot of people specifically avoid the AC comments, so I try to help bring the good ones to attention when I have mod points :)
I was mostly just criticising moderation of discussion of the summary as off-topic, because I disagree with the judgment. As far as I'm aware criticising moderation is still fair game, and I do disagree with that decision enough to speak up about it. Maybe I'm missing something here, but why is it off-topic to discuss part of the summary? It was allowed in the submission, but we're not allowed to discuss it? If that's the case, why have a submission at all, rather than just a link to the article with a quote from it? Sure, someone marked it out, but it seems wrong to try burying the discussion that got it fixed in the first place. The damage was already done by having it at all, and no amount of downmodding is going to bring back article discussion that was lost.
As for the actual article, it was definitely of interest to me, and is why I read the summary at all (the rant at the end was just too off-putting to ignore and refocused my attention). It's a continuation of the same sort of insanity that resulted in a student being harassed for "killing a pet dinosaur" recently, and it needs to stop. This BS is getting well into thought crime territory, and that's a scary place for law enforcement to be at. I have a feeling it's just going to get worse before it gets better, though...
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Monday September 01 2014, @03:30PM
My misunderstanding then.
Interesting that you mention nicks and who they might be - many of the staff have completely different nicks on here than those they use on IRC. I'm often not sure to whom I'm talking!
Your comments are very much on-topic, although we would rather forget that terrible mistake. Still trying to get to the bottom of how it happened but I suspect it is nothing more sinister than human error.
I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
(Score: 2) by Marand on Monday September 01 2014, @11:06PM
That's what I suspect, too. Rather than forget it, though, I kind of hope it ends up like someone else said and just turns into an in-joke of sorts for the site. SN's own meme instead of borrowing slashdot ones. Probably healthier for everybody in the long-term than trying to forget about it and pretend it didn't happen. Shit happens, not the end of the world, just has to be called out and then forgiven. Maybe teased about it later ;)
(Score: 2) by cafebabe on Tuesday September 02 2014, @12:09PM
So, this is like our Noodle Incident [tvtropes.org]? Perhaps it could be called the Crazy Hobo Post [soylentnews.org]?
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(Score: 5, Insightful) by mcgrew on Saturday August 30 2014, @01:25PM
Agreed completely. The way the summary was written just begs for a gun control flame war and almost guarantees that there will be little discussion about the actual topic, which really has absolutely nothing to do with the editorializing at all.
Shame on both the submitter and editor, that was incredibly lame. This is a first amendment issue, not second amendment.
OK, now on to the actual topic -- considering that Nobots had cannibalism, necrophilia, and billions dead, and Mars, Ho! has hookers, drug abuse, and thousands dead, I guess I'll never have a job teaching school. Not that I'd want to (I'm retired).
Odd how the neither the submitter nor the school doesn't seem to care care about freedom of speech.
Impeach Donald Saruman and his sidekick Elon Sauron
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bzipitidoo on Saturday August 30 2014, @05:28PM
Another issue is that this is yet another story about school officials being stupidly overbearing. Yes, they should be rebuked and their bad decisions and rules rolled back. They should probably be fired, but a demotion is likely the most they'll suffer.
But it's not big news. School officials are not the brightest people. They like to simplify their world no matter what that does to others, and are likely to go for extreme blanket bans with no nuance or flex. They'd probably love to have a computer do a search of everything for the word "gun", and give them a list. If that list includes a third of the books in the library and half the students, so be it. They'd get busy going through the list, without considering if the whole thing is really good idea. Huckleberry Finn is a regular on banned book lists, for the "n" word. They need constant oversight.
Also, schools are all too attractive to the sort of person who enjoys abusing power to make others' lives harder, and they're petty enough to take this out on children. They'd buy a dog to bully if they couldn't worm their way into a school district.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @06:38PM
This. The story here isn't about guns but about the people in charge of schools. I worked in a school for a few years: the bright teachers left after a couple of years, the average joes stuck around, and the dumbest of the PE/wood shop/special ed crowd became administrators. There were no administrators at our school with academic backgrounds, and nearby schools who did have more academic backgrounds got the ones who were the bottom of the barrel. It's a low-prestige job that doesn't attract the best and brightest.
That's the paradox with schools: we demand that they make our kids smarter, but we don't treat the teachers and administrators in a way that would attract smart people to the job. It's not just pay; pay is only a symptom. It's a fundamental disdain for education that I haven't seen in Europe or Japan, and it makes teaching (and administration) an undesirable job that attracts undesirables who do stupid things like blanket-banning materials that mention guns.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Yates on Saturday August 30 2014, @01:36PM
I too am most disturbed that the editor did not remove the submitters editorial before sending this to the front page. I'm assuming of course LaminatorX did not add the editorial himself which would make me even more disturbed. One of the reasons news sources are supposed to remain neutral is to not lose half of your audience when you start putting out highly polarized opinions such as this, and SoylentNews does not have a large enough audience for such nonsense. At this point I would not be unhappy to see the offending text removed off the bottom and replaced with some kind of 'oops, sorry' message.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Fnord666 on Saturday August 30 2014, @04:40PM
I have not found a way to see the actual submission here on SN once it comes out of the queue. Anyone know where we can find it?
(Score: 4, Informative) by janrinok on Sunday August 31 2014, @02:33PM
Here it is: http://soylentnews.org/submit.pl?op=viewsub&subid=3574 [soylentnews.org]
We have a set of editorial guidelines and procedures to prevent this sort of mistake - and on this occasion they didn't work. However, the editors are spread around the globe and it is a holiday weekend in the US. Our internal inquiry to find out exactly how this happened, and to look at where and why the procedures didn't work will take several days because not all the editors involved will be back on before Monday. It has not been swept under the carpet and we will learn the necessary lessons.
I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 02 2014, @12:44PM
Problem is if he did remove it all the trolls and hypocrites would be crying "censorship!".
For the editors (and I'm not one of them) you're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't.
For those that reckon they can do a better job, volunteer some time and prove it.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Saturday August 30 2014, @04:36PM
Well at least in TFS facts were separated from opinions :)
I am familiar with smallish towns where hunting is still commonplace and 12 years olds go with dad to the range with their compressed air rifle. I don't debate whether availability is a factor in school shootings. But then consider other factors [youtu.be].
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Sunday August 31 2014, @02:46PM
I owned an air rifle at age six, killed my first rabbit with a 20 guage at age 8, and won a turkey shoot at age 12.
Learning firearm safety at a young age is very important IMO.
Impeach Donald Saruman and his sidekick Elon Sauron
(Score: 2) by marcello_dl on Saturday August 30 2014, @07:45PM
the ranting and name-calling in their so-called "articles"
Indeed they belong in the "comments".
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by Dunbal on Saturday August 30 2014, @10:37AM
I gave this site a chance. Fuck this site.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by wonkey_monkey on Saturday August 30 2014, @11:33AM
Umm, OK bye? Sorry you had such a terrible time being forced to read stories on this free website.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @01:28PM
There is a definite quality problem on this site.
Let's not make things worse with an attitude problem.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @08:18PM
You must be new here.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @09:24PM
We're *all* new here.
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Sunday August 31 2014, @01:11AM
Khyber?
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Sunday August 31 2014, @02:49PM
LOL - well done EF!
I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by unauthorized on Saturday August 30 2014, @02:57PM
Being free has nothing to do with it. Doing a poor job at attracting/retaining readership is a valid point of criticism for a website which is trying to do just that, free or not. Let's not argue against bad logic with more bad logic, there are enough flamewars on the Internet as it is.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not condoning people who whine about leaving in the comments. Being displeased with the service is no excuse to disrupt it for other people. That is why we have a moderation system.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Fnord666 on Saturday August 30 2014, @04:53PM
Unfortunately the moderation system does not, as of yet, extend to moderation of the front page stories. If this isn't in the feature request list, it should be.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Sunday August 31 2014, @02:54PM
Moderation of the front page stories is the responsibility of the editors - we got it wrong. We are trying to correct the situation both here and by finding out what exactly happened - because the procedures that we have in place should have prevented just such an occurrence. We realize the damage that has been done to the site and our community. But before you start proposing a complete rewrite of the software can we please have some time to find out why it went wrong?
I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @02:59PM
Why?
What is wrong with this?
I write fiction. Arresting people for writing fiction is news and it is interesting.
Care to share?
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Saturday August 30 2014, @04:45PM
I don't see anything suggesting that the teacher was arrested.
Having said that, losing your job on writing fiction is of course also news.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by tathra on Saturday August 30 2014, @05:34PM
if you're complaining about the lack of quality stories while not submitting stories yourself, you're part of the problem.
if you want to see better stories, submit them! remember: "be the change that you wish to see in the world".
(Score: 3, Interesting) by cafebabe on Saturday August 30 2014, @11:09AM
I'm pro-autonomy and that includes being pro-gun. Banning "assault" rifles or handguns does very little to stop disaffected youth from going on murderous rampages. The one thing that will help is inclusivity. Specifically, the people going postal aren't getting laid.
As an example, Charles Whitman, the 1966 clocktower shooter, was a military trained sharpshooter with an IQ of 139 who was court martialled, demoted then discharged from the Marines. He began by killing his wife and mother before killing another 14 and wounding 32.
The 1999 Columbine massacre was conducted by two goths who had received homosexual slurs.
In the 1987 Hungerford massacre in the UK, the unemployed assailant shot primarily at women, including his mother.
In the 1996 Dunblane massacre in the UK, the assailant only shot female teachers and, curiously, female toilets.
Moving beyond young men, the assailant of the 2001 Osaka massacre in Japan was discharged from the Japanese Air Force due to paedophilia, got imprisoned for rape, lived with his mother and got married four times before killing mostly girls at an elite school with a sword.
Moving beyond school massacres and young men, the 2010 Raoul Moat case in the UK began when an ex-prisoner was provoked by female social workers and an ex-girlfriend who falsely told him that she was in a relationship with a police officer. Raoul Moat, the ex-girlfriend and the new partner all died.
And then we have Karl Halverson Pierson and Elliot Rodger who were quite obviously not getting laid. A curious anomaly was that Elliot Rodger killed more males. However, I attribute this to getting cock-blocked.
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @11:18AM
I suspect it's mostly not about "not getting laid", but about having been messed around, screwed over, lied to, and deceived by, particularly narcissistic women and girls.
The absolute worst kind of bullies tend to be female, because they tend to more often fuck you over psychologically, than physically.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @12:44PM
Oh really. As if men don't ever do anything to mess with women. I'd be laughing, if your thoughts weren't so sick.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @01:38PM
You appear to have that backwards. More Like: Failure for these 'special' guys to find a female codependent to lavish them with the narcissistic supply to which they feel entitled.
Statistical anecdote to the contrary: I've come up against more male than female psychopaths. I guess everyone gets caught off guard at least once in their life. This is how those of us capable of experiencing empathy for others learn how intolerable abusive behaviour is and how totally pathetic perpetrators really are.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Saturday August 30 2014, @04:43PM
Wish you would post with your name. That was spot on.
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Saturday August 30 2014, @04:48PM
Why?
And BTW, "tibman" is your real name? I didn't think so.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Saturday August 30 2014, @06:18PM
I liked the comment and if i saw that posters name again i would pay more attention to what they said. IRL name is not required, just a unique identifier : )
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @01:13PM
By your own post, Charles had a wife, no reason to think he wasn't getting laid.
The two Columbine goths had girlfriends.
The Hungerford guy shot at both men and women, whoever came into contact with him.
The Dunblane guy shot women, because he went to a primary school where most of the teachers are usually women. It's not clear he was looking only for women. He also shot children, not just girls. He was upset because he wanted to be a Scout leader and his motives toward boys were being questioned. So this doesn't look like he was angry with women, more like he was frustrated he wasn't allowed to get near boys.
The Osaka guy was married 4 times, apparently able to get laid at least 4 times.
The Raoul Moat guy had a girlfriend, but couldn't keep her.
Karl Halverson Pierson was after his teacher and debate coach, a man, the girl he shot was just in the wrong place. No one knows if he ever got laid, but he was only 18.
Elliot Rodger appears to have been a self entitled asshole, who would want to screw him?
Are you perhaps projecting?
You apparently think every guy, no matter his age, or personality is entitled to get laid. News flash, some women also have trouble getting some, it's not just men.
(Score: 2) by cafebabe on Saturday August 30 2014, @01:51PM
The guy who was married and killed his wives obviously wasn't happy with the relationship. The Osaka guy and Raoul Moat had previously formed sexual relationships but hadn't been in one for years. And, apparently, I should research the over cases in more detail.
Regardless, after reading the first half of Elliot Rodger's 100,0000 word life story (which he obviously recalled with great clarity), he was neurotic to the point that he had great difficulty speaking to women. This was not helped by his stature, or his relationship with his mother, his step-mother, his younger half-sister or his only female friend. And it was further complicated by international ties and high-profile success of the people around him. For example, his father worked with Jennifer Lawrence and he'd been invited to two Star Wars premieres.
If there is any projecting in this matter, it is because I know someone who committed suicide in similar circumstances.
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(Score: 3, Insightful) by tathra on Saturday August 30 2014, @05:40PM
so in other words, "not getting laid" was more of a symptom of larger problems, like a lack of social skills and social support and in some cases unrealistic expectations of others, and not really the problem at all.
(Score: 2) by cafebabe on Saturday August 30 2014, @06:05PM
From Elliot Rodger's own words:-
So, it was most definitely because he couldn't get laid. But what compounded the problem was his height (which led to him being bullied repeatedly and gave him anxiety about his attractiveness), negative experiences with almost all females younger than his grandmothers and the world-class success of the people around him. For example, before his parents got divorced, one of their neighbors commercialized barcodes and was worth US$40 million. After his parents got divorced, he was acutely embarrassed that he was living in a Hollywood apartment without a swimming pool. At school, that made him one of the poor kids on two counts.
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(Score: 3, Insightful) by tathra on Saturday August 30 2014, @06:31PM
i stand by my point, its a symptom of larger problems. this is a case of tunnel vision, being too focused on one thing to see the broader picture and real problem, and you can't fix a problem if you don't know what it is. if his only problem was wanting to get laid he could've gotten hookers, but since he didn't (or if he did, it obviously didnt address his real needs) it shows that the real problem was the isolation and lack of social support. if he had friends, he could've gotten them to act as wingmen and help get him hooked up, but he lacked the social skills and the confidence to use them (from his own words, due to being bullied - abused - as a child). thinking he could get a woman beyond just a hooker without the proper social skills and effort is an example of unrealistic expectations of others.
(Score: 2) by cafebabe on Saturday August 30 2014, @07:12PM
Any of these killers could have found a prostitute, used a date rape drug or become a gunpoint/knifepoint rapist but they wanted to have an ongoing relationship with a woman and raise a family. When to honorable path became astronomically remote, they weren't defeated. They didn't commit suicide. They came to the public's attention in a spectacular fashion. To ask the question "Why did this case happen?" is misguided. We should be asking "Why are such cases rare?" and "How can we improve the MTBF?"
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @09:08PM
Oh, puhleeze! Sop right now! You are breaking my heart! Maybe we should start a charity for for these poor Hollywood youth? The script for the TV commercial charity pitch practically writes itself:
(Score: 2) by cafebabe on Saturday August 30 2014, @10:54PM
He was bullied repeatedly because of his size which adversely affected his esteem and ability to form relationships with girls. Then he was bullied due to the reduced status which accompanied divorce which adversely affected his esteem and ability to form relationships with girls. Then, after requesting to enrol at a private boys school (specifically to avoid girls) he was further bullied until he dropped out. Despite being able to write 100,000 words coherently, he barely graduated.
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(Score: 4, Insightful) by kaszz on Saturday August 30 2014, @02:27PM
Like someone else said, it's more like the persons in questions got messed around, screwed over, lied to and deceived by particularly abusive people. Some are pathologically abusive without meaning to, others are just normal scumbags that got the chance opportunity to express on their bad qualities without any checks and bounds.
Be nice to people unless they are abusive. Give people real help ie not just chatting. Get in touch with reality and deal with it. There's usually a history of forced exclusion, neglect and abuse during a long time before things like this happen. And easy access to weapons. Administrators are also usually a particular incompetent to detect and defuse bad settings. In fact they may be a part of it. So they can't be a part of the solution in many cases.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @06:07PM
This guy is spot on. I've had to deal with this shit my whole life - forced exclusion, constant psychological abuse from "friends", and a refusal from everyone to even acknowledge there's a problem, much less any help explaining how I "bring it on [my]self." I don't plan on going on a homicidal rampage, but I can understand why people do.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by BasilBrush on Saturday August 30 2014, @08:03PM
the 1966 clocktower shooter
The 1999 Columbine massacre
the 1987 Hungerford massacre in the UK
the 1996 Dunblane massacre in the UK,
the 2001 Osaka massacre.
You're cherry picking.
There's a big long list of US school massaceres, most of which you don't mention. And yet you do go on to massacres of other kinds and other countries.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_shooting [wikipedia.org]
Basically you're choosing ones which you believe support your theory, and ignoring the vast majority, which mostly don't support it. Your theory is therefore nothing more than what you would like to be true.
Hurrah! Quoting works now!
(Score: 2) by cafebabe on Saturday August 30 2014, @09:03PM
I was not attempting to cherry-pick. That was the list of incidences I could recall without reference. If I used a more comprehensive list, I would have been side-tracked and unlikely to report on the issue. As an example, I am reading page 82 of 141 of Elliot Rodger's life story. The list you provided has about 100 cases with references to more and excludes incidences such as Raoul Moat and Anders Breivik (who did not come to mind but has similarities with Elliot Rodger).
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(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @08:51PM
So what are you offering as a solution? Free lap dances for all disaffected men in our society? I've been feeling pretty disaffected myself lately. Where should I sign up? More seriously, you might want to consider that getting laid is not a fundamental right of every horny male. Women do not have any obligation to put out for men. (I only wish it were so.) Perhaps the solution is for men to grow up and realize that the Universe does not revolve around their dick.
(Score: 2) by cafebabe on Saturday August 30 2014, @10:36PM
I only see this problem being resolved when it is eclipsed by more significant events. Specifically, evolutionary pressures, such as war, have ensured that women outnumbered the surviving men. The pressures on women (opportunities, finances, property rights, voting rights) compelled a woman to accept any man or face spinsterhood and childlessness.
If I may detour into biology, male sperm is lighter the female sperm and, even taking into account genetic problem specific to XY, I believe there are 107 male births for every 100 female births. The males grow bigger, are more energetic and require more protein. However, in our current situation, they are not getting killed by predators/hunting accidents/hostile neighbors at historical rates. In addition, the most populous countries (India, China) are practising selective abortion in which 50 million were never born. In some cases, men are marrying international brides but this only diffuses the problem rather than solving it.
In addition to this huge male imbalance, women have a vast market of potential suitors. Historically, when the majority of people lived in rural locations, a woman would have less than a dozen men within her social status. Nowadays, a woman in a large metropolis may have more than 10,000 and it may be possible to dismiss candidates with a swipe on a smartphone or, conceivably, a glance or facial expression [soylentnews.org]. In aggregate, women are attracted to men with a very limited range of physical attributes. The 2% of men with these attributes are getting sexually exhausted. (Quite a few are limiting themselves to sex with five women per week because they're not getting anything else done.) However, the remainder are being ignored even if they are sane, healthy, educated, financially solvent and quite desirable by historical standards.
Many of the men being ignored believe in equality but an increasing proportion of them have dissonant experience of equality. It isn't sufficient to tell these men that they should hone a marketable skill for 20 years, achieve true financial independence and maybe wait for a suitable woman to come along. They've seen one guy in their class work is way through 1/2 the girls in the class and they want it too. And this is where we come to your point: Women are not obliged to spread their affections equally.
If social circumstances don't resolve this situation (war, employment rights, financial retreat) then technology may overtake. Unfortunately, stem cell technology may make the situation far worse before it makes it better [soylentnews.org]. This is because Female To Male transsexuals are likely to get functioning reproductive organs before Male To Female transsexuals. Furthermore, this will be from an operation which is less invasive and with lesser consequences for the individual. This may add to the sex imbalance but not necessarily in a manner which finds equilibrium because these XX males will only be able to have male children with an XY female. In the general case, the unknown number of procreating transsexuals will create a disproportionate of children in opposition to their acquired sex. And all of this has unpredictable consequences on sex-selective abortion.
We may also find that gay relationships without procreation become universally accepted for environmental reasons.
In summary, depending on your circumstances and preferences, finding a man or a woman may be become ridiculously easy, ridiculously hard or swing between to two. No-one knows.
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(Score: 3, Insightful) by Magic Oddball on Saturday August 30 2014, @11:46PM
I only see this problem being resolved when it is eclipsed by more significant events. Specifically, evolutionary pressures, such as war, have ensured that women outnumbered the surviving men. The pressures on women (opportunities, finances, property rights, voting rights) compelled a woman to accept any man or face spinsterhood and childlessness.
That's not only a creepy fantasy, it's unrealistic. Even if women outnumbered men by a large margin in our society, we *still* wouldn't pick the kind of sociopathically unstable guys that shoot up schools -- we'd opt either to be single (which isn't all that big a deal, trust me), share the good men, or pair up together (platonically or otherwise). Women that had an overwhelming desire to become mothers would use technology or ask a close male friend to get them pregnant, just as they have in the past.
As for the rest of what you wrote, I can't tell if you were only describing your fantasy, or if it's (as it sounds in parts) describing your perception of real-life people/society. I can say that most XY women don't have a big smorgasbord of men to choose from in real life, any more than most men do, and that the traits in a man that drive women away will also drive men away from a woman.
(Score: 2) by cafebabe on Sunday August 31 2014, @01:33AM
What you describe as a "creepy fantasy" is historical fact. Furthermore, while I hope that technology (and easy access to technology) continues to progress, allowing everyone to overcome accident of birth, I cannot guarantee it. We're also in a situation where peace and prosperity in North America and Western Europe plus the interaction between Eastern cultural practices and medical technology has created tens of millions of men for which there are no corresponding women. This is contrary to the historical situation where males would be disproportionately killed by predators or hostile tribes.
Many of these "surplus" men are working in agricultural jobs while a disproportionate number of women migrate to cities and have a more substantial sex life. In some cases, women have completely deserted villages and, in the case of China's one child families, it is unclear where the next generation of farmers will come from.
Regarding the rest of my "fantasy", perhaps some figures would help? Take the population of China where selective abortion accurs. According to the CIA World Factbook, China has 704,828,835 males and 654,757,003 females - a surplus of 50,071,832 males. Assume that Female To Male transsexuals will be able to procreate first. Assume that 0.01% of China's females take this option. There are now 65,000 less females. A proportion of these former females may also want a female partner. This creates additional pressure.
The sex imbalance is eased if there are more Male To Female transsexuals but this advance is not likely to be developed first, may not be equally affordable and may not be equally popular.
I don't know enough to knowledgeably comment on your experiences as/with XY women but if it involves any intimacy, you have the advantage over many of today's young men.
Regarding attractive traits, an attractive personality is fairly universal. However, men are attracted to a more diverse range of physical traits. Exceptions are numerous.
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(Score: 3, Insightful) by velex on Monday September 01 2014, @05:35PM
Oh, wow. Interesting thread. Let me interject a few things:
The reason it isn't sufficient is because when this 40-something who's financially secure starts dating 20-year old girls, then we call him a cradle-robber and a pedophile. On the other hand, we don't much care about 20-something girls who date 40-something guys; we just make sure to demonize the guy.
I watched my friend who was dating someone 10 years younger wind up completely ostracised because of this factor. Well, it didn't help that she lied about being raped, and one of the local white knights ran with it.
I'm not sure I entirely understand what you're talking about, and I think you're making a number of assumptions that might not pan out. Stem cell technology may be able to create functional male genitalia out of cells with an XX makeup, but I thinking it'll be more likely in those cases that one of those Xes will need to be swapped out for a Y from a close relative. Afaik, it's all still pure speculation. However, I could see the case where you end up with a man who only produces X sperm.
You touched on the possibility of growing a fully functional female reproductive system from XY cells. My gut tells me this is less likely, and a trans woman desiring this operation would need to obtain a different copy of X from a close relative if it's not possible to clone her X (maybe it would cause complications if one of the Xes were a clone of the other).
The are also a lot of unknowns in my mind if we want to talk about gender ratio when bringing in trans folks. Last I looked for numbers about a decade ago, nobody really knew but common estimates I heard were that it's a 3:1 ratio. There are 3 trans women for every 1 trans man, meaning 3 men become women and 1 woman becomes a man. There have been no studies that I know of as to why.
Then there's the question of access to such procedures. We all lose our shit when it comes to trans folks. The idea that a trans prerson might get any form of assistance for the medical aspect of transition makes blood boil. The thing is, though, that's in a culture that tells men they are sexual objects and servants of women, and if they can't find a woman to own them, they're nothing. Then the other half of the culture says it's true in reverse! What a mess. This is also a culture that does not have the technology to accommodate gender change without losing reproductive ability, which is apparently all that matters to this species.
Oh, and they worry too much about what makes them "gay" or not. (This is a conversation that seems inevitable when a trans woman dates a man. I think it's one part worry about being a homosexual and thus being less than a man and another part worry about being seen by others as a homosexual.)
Let's assume these miracle stem-cell gender change technologies exist. Under the current capitalist medical system combined with a healthy dose of screwball feminism, that leaves one essentially two options for having children if one wasn't lucky enough to be born with a womb. The first is to make enough money early on so that it becomes a better financial option for a woman to marry one and have children than not. Opportunity cost, etc. If one isn't able to provide a woman with better than she could do on her own, why would she marry? The idea of a "househusband" is too unworkable for this species, life isn't fair, etc, although I was glad to see an example in Madoka Magica. The other option is growing a new reproductive system and having it implanted is some radical surgical procedure that won't be cheap.
However, the existence of such a radical gender change procedure takes the wind straight out of the sails of the arguments for transphobia. On the part of the feminists, they're going to have a difficult time when the only way to tell the difference between an agent of the patriarchy and a "womyn-born-womyn" is by doing a genetic test. A genetic test would need to be a prerequisite of registering of the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival! On the part of the other bigots, they're going to have a hard time calling someone who looks, acts, and sounds "like a woman" and is 7 month pregnant that they're really a man. (Then again, I can imagine how that would go. A: "You're a man, aren't you?" B: "Of course not! Can't you see I'm pregnant?!" A: "Ok, you have breasts, a womb, are pregnant, smell like a woman, have sex with men, have a female name, and will resume your period after delivering the baby, but you're still a man!")
Then we would need to revise our attitudes. If one knew the only way they'd get grandchildren were by financing their son or daughter's gender change, that'd be a very different world!
Eh, who am I kidding. Technology for that would only be accessible to folks like Harisoo or Jennifer Boylan. I doubt it would ever be a significant factor. Add in that the estimate that may 1 in every 10,000 or 30,000 people assigned the male gender at birth transition. So the factor you're talking about, if I understand, as concerns the proportions of men and women in a given society, may be present but insignificant.
Young men these days face an overwhelming amount of sexism. If we ignore how school from elementary through college is a hostile environment where they experience discrimination on a daily basis—and sexual harassment that's built into sexist policy—, ignore the profusion of male-bashing in mainstream entertainment (I wonder if the feminists ever considered that the misogyny on multiplayer video games is retaliation and venting after having to hear the same jokes that just aren't funny over and over again), ignore how gay men have their identities violated every time they are presumed to be attracted to women and continually bashed about the issue of rape (why should I focus on gay men when every man who has not committed rape experiences institutional discrimination), we're really ignoring the elephant in the room.
And I'm not just looking at feminism or "all women" when I write that. I'm also looking at men—regular men who are a-ok with it because, hey, after all, guys can handle it! (Again, sexism.) I'm looking at that white knight who inevitably responds to me and tells me I'm only angry with feminism because I can't get laid. (Sexism and implicit homophobia.) Then if I feed the troll, the homophobia becomes explicit with the inevitable response that I'm mentally ill. I'm looking at the men's rights movement who send the signal to men that if they're not straight as an arrow, then they're an evil communist socialist.
Circumcision probably doesn't help, either. If circumcision worked out just fine for any particular individual, then great for them. If they like being circumcised, great. Except, for the 1 out of 500 men that circumcision goes wrong for, it can be a living hell, especially not knowing that one was even circumcised at all. Just that we don't even consider the idea that, if the "science" supporting the practice is good, then it should still be an individual man's choice, speaks volumes. What happened to "my body, my choice?" (Ok, so I am partially looking at the feminist movement here, except more in disappointment that they were so provincial and chauvinistic in that statement that they didn't even consider that it needs a much larger scope than they meant it to have, and I don't think they understand that for some victims of the circumcision gone wrong, it's a tough pill to swallow to be asked to support "my body, my choice" when the victim of circumcision doesn't even have any voices decrying what happened to him (/her?).)
In short, we have a big problem with misandry, and we are hopelessly slipshod in the ethics department when it comes to men.
(Score: 2) by cafebabe on Tuesday September 02 2014, @12:52AM
I'm glad this gained your interest.
Regarding age differences, this is part of the equality dissonance. Males and females grow to different sizes over different timespans, mature at different rates, gain verbal fluency at different rates and have different reproductive lifespans. Historically, a man would obtain one or more women after an extended period which allowed selective pressure. This model is akin to a silverback gorilla who gains access to a harem. More recently, a man would have established himself as a craftsman before seeking a wife. Nowadays, a man is shamed if he dates a younger woman while cougars are borderline acceptable.
Regarding genetics, my scenario makes many assumptions but I'm not aware of any limitation which prevents XX or XY cells splitting to X or Y gametes at the final step. Assuming this process works, hypothetical Y eggs would only be viable with X sperm. Therefore, XY women would have reduced fertility with XY men and the sex of children would be skewed to approximately 2/3 male and 1/3 female. Taking into account weight of Y sperm, this would be further skewed by a small factor. Overall, we would have situation where XY women are more likely to have XY children and XX men are more likely to have XX children. So, any swing in the male/female demographic due to fertile transsexuals would have a mild opposing effect in the following generation.
Ignoring genetics, the adage in transsexual urological surgery of "It's easier to dig a hole than build a pole" is going to be broken. Cell culturing and 3D printing will make it easy to produce a penis of any size. (Expect future pornstars to have two or more because, well, why chance having the old ones removed?) However, grafting a 3D printed uterus will be significantly more awkward than grafting a 3D printed penis.
To add further assumptions, the general level of homophobia and transphobia may relax if they weren't regarded as an evolutionary dead-end. This means people who come out of the closet may be less likely to be forced out of their homes, dis-inherited or killed. Likewise, I would hope that people would be less homophobic and transphobic about sexual relations if anyone could procreate with anyone else. (To add a further assumption of political, financial, environmental and social pressure to have two children or less, dis-inheritance may be counter-productive if a homosexual or transsexual child is your only surviving offspring.) Well, that's the rational view. However, you note that it is one of those hot-button issues in which a subset of people lose rational thought. However, I see militant feminists and regressive religious people being fragmented by these advances.
Most feminists accept transgendered women due to their common experiences of sexual assault, attempted rape, rape, sexual objectification and economic opportunities. This acceptance will progress as the next generation of feminists mix with openly transgendered children. Germaine Greer's definition of female (XX, functional uterus) will become a fringe concept or functionally irrelevant. Oh, and the womyn-born-womyn festivals have already been invaded by the clandestine agents of the patriarchy. (Actually, I find this amusing because it riles almost everyone but for different reasons. In an age of equality, many people find womyn-born-womyn festivals to be gratuitous offensive discrimination. My opinion on this is fairly moderate. After reading blog posts about a woman who wanted some space at a gay festival and sex-segregated gymnasiums [soylentnews.org], discussing matters with rape victims and other experiences, I am convinced that sex-segregated activities are healthy for many people. However, it shouldn't be done in a discriminatory manner with no alternative. This is especially true if it involves the public sector. For example, a female-only space at a festival is acceptable if there are other restricted spaces and no-one gets to access all areas. The womyn-born-womyn festivals don't do this. Indeed, their policies for Female To Male transsexuals is mixed. Also, their existence is divisive to Male To Female transsexuals because some would never be able to slip in, many wouldn't want to be involved and others wouldn't be able to bring their friends. And then there's the people who don't self-identify as male or female.)
Regarding figures, approximately 1:3000 is the lower bound for self-identifying transsexuals and, yes, the ratio of 3:1 has been found between Male To Female transsexuals and Female To Male transsexuals. However, many transsexuals self-identify as gay or lesbian. In countries like Thailand, they don't make a big distinction between homosexual, transvestite, transsexual or other. Worldwide, it may be that more than 10% of males have transvestite tendencies and more than 1% of "males" are transsexual. The corresponding level of transvestism in women is unknown. However, I know from the experience of a Female To Male acquaintance that attempting to dress in a masculine manner can be maddening when all masculine fashions are socially accepted.
The common assumption is that Male To Female transsexuals are more common but this may be due to transvestism being more obvious and feminization of masculine features being less successful while Female To Male transsexuals have more limited surgical options, more relief (or not) via accepted fashion and/or self-identify as lesbians. If we consider the developmental effects of hormones in other animals [wikipedia.org], it may be the case that Female To Male transsexuals may be very common. Although self-identity and mate attraction are distinct, disputed figures for PCO [PolyCystic Ovaries] and PCOS [PolyCystic Ovary Syndrome] in lesbians may emphasize the significance of hormones. From http://lezgetreal.com/2008/10/lesbians-and-pcos/ [lezgetreal.com], http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15533359 [nih.gov] and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polycystic_ovary_syndrome#Epidemiology [wikipedia.org], 80% of lesbians may have PCO. The 80% incidence of PCO appears to be widely cited by lesbians but the corresponding figure for heterosexual women from one source is 8-25% and 32% from another. Reports of PCOS cite 38% for lesbians and 3.4%, 14% or 18% for heterosexual women. It is noted that some of the ambiguity derives from vague diagnostic criteria. Regardless, it could be an evolutionary advantage. If a woman has reproductive problems, it may be advantageous for such a woman to adopt masculine behaviors, such as attraction to women, for the benefit of a group.
Regarding access to healthcare, Cuba demonstrates that poor countries can provide good access to healthcare if there is political will. Even without this, the advance of stem cell biology, material science, 3D printing, robots and niche gadgets will make advanced surgery cheaper. I liken the current 3D printers to Johannes Gutenberg's first printing press. They will advance but their full potential may takes hundreds of years. Fortunately, we won't have to wait for their full potential to arrive. It is likely that limbs and organs will be widely available to patients within 20 years. This will be for essential surgery and cosmetic surgery. Perhaps you'd like smaller hands, catgirl ears or a tail? This is all possible. In the longer term, I believe that Iain Banks [wikipedia.org] suggested that people could transform themselves into a really outlandish form, such as a cloud.
Anyhow, if transsexualism became almost universally accepted and there was surgery which retained fertility, the number of Female To Male transsexuals may exceed the number of Male To Female transsexuals.
More to follow.
(Score: 2) by darkfeline on Saturday August 30 2014, @09:13PM
I don't think the problem is so much not getting laid, as it is the social stigma often encountered by men who do not get laid on a regular basis. The problem, which you elude to, is social exclusion/alienation, and the solution is inclusivity. In fact, if you want to be more general and all-inclusive, the true common point in all of the examples you cite (and indeed, in most crimes) are that the people feel driven into a corner, whether socially, emotionally, financially, or otherwise. Even the most cowardly animal, when left with no other option, will fight back.
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 2) by shortscreen on Sunday August 31 2014, @12:19AM
There is a book entitled "Going Postal" by Mark Ames which goes into the history of mass shootings, mostly the workplace variety but also school shootings. In most cases the shooters had been treated unfairly in some way, were being mocked by their peers, and when they tried to get help by going through official channels they were ignored at best.
A few other interesting points I recall from the book:
19th century slave rebellions (which were not as common as you might expect) received a similar kind of "OMG Why Did This Happen!?!?" reactions in the press as do mass shootings today.
The frequency of mass shootings begins to climb in the Reagan era.
In many cases a particular person (eg. the shooter's hated boss at work) seemed to be the target, but by dumb luck and circumstance were not around when the rampage happened.
(Score: 1) by Murdoc on Monday September 01 2014, @12:57AM
The columbine killers weren't goths. A lot of goths have received grief over this misconception.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Marand on Saturday August 30 2014, @11:11AM
The blockquote from TFA seemed interesting, so I'll be reading that later. That said, on to the real beef: what the hell is with the poorly written, batshit crazy ranting after the blockquote? It's not even tangentially related to the article; instead of getting a useful blurb or insightful commentary, we're assaulted with some crazy-fuck stream-of-consciousness ranting because somebody wrote the word "gun" and he felt it was a perfect opportunity to spew garbage over an article submission.
I could complain about the lack of question marks on sentences that should obviously end with them, but it's not worth it, because everything outside the blockquote is off-topic drivel that should never have appeared on the front page of SN at all.
Editors, I appreciate the story being posted, but this is one case where your "less is more" editing style is not appropriate: you should have butchered that submission and rewritten it into something coherent and relevant to the article itself. Don't let the SoylentNews front page turn into a soap box for every crazy internet hobo that can fill out a submission form.
(Score: 2) by McGruber on Sunday August 31 2014, @01:23AM
The history of /. is filled with memorable events, some good (when CmdrTaco proposed), some bad (When Jon Katz was trolled by the Afghanistan Vic-20 user, OMG Ponies). The /. community and editors got through those events, learned from them, and the site and community improved.
I hope this is one of those instances and that, someday, we will remember that time when the Insane Hobo got his article posted.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by RevGregory on Saturday August 30 2014, @11:15AM
Got a recommendation to check this site out. This was the first post I read, it will be the last and only one I read here. The ability to conflate that article into a completely biased and unfounded attack on a totally uninvolved entity is a rare talent and one I avoid no matter what direction the political bias is skewing. I have little doubt that the poster has zero clue about current firearms laws, the lack of enforcement being done, and the actual trends in firearms related crime and death. I am also convinced that the poster is absolutely determined to not learn anything that doesn't conform to their assumptions or engage in a serious debate. I for one will take "The American Disease™" over The European Disease of rampant violent crime and a concerted effort by government and law enforcement to bury the actual numbers to preserve the illusion of security. When seconds count, the police are only minutes away...if you wish to be a VBC (Victim By Choice) that is fine with me, I chose to learn to defend myself and to use effective tools to do so...and I also choose to train others to do the same.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Marand on Saturday August 30 2014, @11:25AM
To be honest, you probably couldn't have joined at a worse time. I'm not sure what happened here, but it's atypical for the site, so don't judge the entire site on one bad submission. I suspect there's going to be an outcry over this from the regulars like myself, too, because we've gotten accustomed to higher quality than this.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Kell on Saturday August 30 2014, @11:34AM
Hi RevGregory. I agree with sibling poster - this is a terribly unfortunate summary for an introduction to SN. Soylent is usually much better than this (and certainly should be much better than this!) Like Slashdot of old, we have our share of biases, crazy and wtf contributors and posters. I hope you'll try SN again sometime in the future and have a better experience. Regardless, this is wakeup call for the editors and community to keep things professional.
Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
(Score: 4, Informative) by maxwell demon on Saturday August 30 2014, @04:52PM
Do you also make your other decisions on a statistical sample of one? Then you're bound to have many misjudgements.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @06:48PM
Are you a nine-year old? Here's a full-auto Uzi with a full mag. It's super effective.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @08:31PM
Laydees and gentlemen, we have a WINNER!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @11:21AM
Try reading the comments...
On the subject itself it seems like these people have serious trouble distinguishing reality and fiction. Also see the dino case just a few articles ago.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by cafebabe on Saturday August 30 2014, @12:04PM
I think the teacher should be commended for spending his own time to think through one of the worst possible scenarios affecting his pupils and pupils in general. Unfortunately, he had good reason for not doing under his real name while working in his strongest medium (English literature).
I might read these books just so I can be informed, first hand, about this person's views/fictionalization. The last time I done this, I broadly agreed with the person to the extent that I would not have able to explain myself so eloquently in the same circumstances. Specifically, one of the police officers from Ferguson, Missouri was described as a racist, sexist, homophobic, ranting killer [dailymail.co.uk]. Well, I listened to his one hour speech [youtube.com] in full and found him to be a reasonable, patriotic, nine-tour military-trained officer of good standing. And, again, this is a man who spends his own time advancing the public good. As a God-fearing Southerner, you'd expect his views on homosexuality to be regressive but is this different to the majority of his community? Unfortunately, this and passing comments about domestic violence arrangements may have got him suspended.
Overall, I'm concerned that civil servants in the US aren't allowed to express passionate views when off-duty which are representative of their community and in the common good.
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(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Walzmyn on Saturday August 30 2014, @11:43AM
Keep your pacification bullshit outta the summary. Stick it in a comment if you want.
You might want to take notice of the fact that the places that deny guns (Chicago, D.C., etc...) are the places that have the shootings.
There haven't been any school shootings where teachers are allowed to carry concealed.
(And if we did away with all the guns, the loons would just use knives)
(Score: 2, Insightful) by cafebabe on Saturday August 30 2014, @12:26PM
"If guns are outlawed then only outlaws will have guns." Even if guns are eliminated, people can still kill with swords and knifes. The elimination of guns only reduces a person's effective radius. It does not reduce it to zero and it does not eliminate the underlying cause. Indeed, is it worthwhile to ban weapons when it leaves people vulnerable to nutjobs, de facto criminals or a rogue government? "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
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(Score: 1) by pnkwarhall on Saturday August 30 2014, @07:26PM
For some reason (maybe it's the context of this article/discussion, or just a result of my thinking of late) cafebabe's signature, which I've seen many times, suddenly changed from a simple statement describing the general public's understanding of computer technology, to a much more meaningful and poignant critique of the Internet.
Lift Yr Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven
(Score: 2) by cafebabe on Saturday August 30 2014, @08:28PM
For reference, I could only fit the following into 120 characters:-
but the full quote is:-
And if you access the hyperlink and read to the end, you would have been rewarded with the following:-
I chose the first quote as a sarcastic comment about "big data" analytics. They also show that, for centuries, people without a STEM background have been asking wrongheaded questions and that experts have held diametrically opposed views without scientifically testing them.
However, you are are correct. Any group of idiots with an Internet connection can get wrongheaded answers with less intermediation. First and foremost are proponents of "post-modern" Critical Code Studies [wikipedia.org] who critique source code at great length [10print.org] without understanding software. Unfortunately, striking them repeatedly with InterLisp manuals [fau.edu] would be of most benefit to the people holding the manuals.
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(Score: 1) by pnkwarhall on Saturday August 30 2014, @09:26PM
I appreciate your explanation of the significance of the quote for you. That's the nice thing about quotes -- they can mean many things to many people simultaneously.
As for the significance to me:
I feel there's a prevalent view that the Internet is a force "for good", for the evolution and development of humanity (especially in tech circles). How does that work exactly, if the majority of the content on the web is porn, marketing garbage, and better-and-better disguised propaganda/social engineering efforts?
Soylent was created as a reaction to to the slide of /. into... well, what it's become, which includes a glut of article summaries written as blatant propaganda (and selection of the articles themselves). (I hope that) The outcry against this article's summary displays the intent of the Soylent community to maintain a certain standard for the discussion on the site -- which could be considered (like any website) a microcosm of the 'net at large. I believe sincerely that "garbage in == garbage out", which is why this discussion about the summary is important. But as a general comment on the Internet -- if we fill the Internet with garbage (i.e. "the wrong figures"), the right answers for humanity will not come out.
Lift Yr Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Thexalon on Sunday August 31 2014, @01:54AM
Yes, and yes. And there's a decent argument that reducing someone's effective radius (and ability to kill through barriers) is a useful thing to be doing if you want to reduce the body count when somebody flips out and starts killing people.
Yes, address the underlying causes that cause people to go on rampages. But if it were possible to completely eliminate guns, it's likely that somebody on a rampage would kill closer to 3-4 people rather than 25. For example, if somebody starts slashing a sword at a school, it's relatively easy for people to run away from them, put locked doors in between, or even grab a sturdy stick and push them away - it's not perfect, of course, but it reduces the damage quite a bit.
"Think of how stupid the average person is. Then realize half of 'em are stupider than that." - George Carlin
(Score: 2) by cafebabe on Sunday August 31 2014, @09:55AM
I agree with your figures. My concern is that we may optimize for one rare case (and ignore the underlying problems) while leaving people with greatly reduced defences in more common cases. It is premature optimization.
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 01 2014, @10:09AM
knives/swords have a smaller radius then guns, true
on the other hands guns are way louder and thus the use of gun will warn other nearby potential victims that danger is near, in a way a knife wont
most of the articles about school knifings (mostly from china) I've seen have higher body counts then the mass shootings in the US
(Score: 3, Insightful) by nyder on Saturday August 30 2014, @12:22PM
Currently they are going after people who write stuff, how much longer till it's thought crimes they go after?
(Score: 1) by enharmonix on Saturday August 30 2014, @04:08PM
There is no such thing as though crime, sir. Please come with me for re-education.
(Score: 2) by mrchew1982 on Saturday August 30 2014, @06:34PM
Sir, your Psycho-Pass has become clouded, please respond to the nearest facility for emergency counseling!
(Score: 2) by PinkyGigglebrain on Saturday August 30 2014, @06:39PM
How is this not a thought crime?
Written words are thoughts on paper.
This person is being punished because his thoughts are not in line with what school's admins think is "correct". Same as the teenager in the USA who got arrested for saying he killed his neighbor's pet dinosaur with a gun.
Say something that isn't "correct" and in line with the majority group think and you will be treated as a criminal by the powers that be.
So the real question is what will have to happen to change it?
"Beware those who would deny you Knowledge, For in their hearts they dream themselves your Master."
(Score: 2) by Techwolf on Saturday August 30 2014, @01:06PM
This is lunacy. School administrators are terrified there will be another Columbine or Sandy Hook and are overreacting, or are they. What could they do to prevent one. Nothing, nil, zero. No need to ask yourself 'why', say thank you to the traitorous NRA , the propaganda arm of the small arms manufacturing industry, for blocking any form of gun control. They have successfully infected the country with The American Disease™ almost unfettered access to weapons of war that kill with brutal efficiency. Sadly there appears to be no cure.
Was this a quote from the book?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by mcgrew on Saturday August 30 2014, @01:31PM
Did you learn your lesson? Lots of comments, absolutely no discussion whatever about the guy getting fired for writing fiction. From the comments we missed getting a new member of the S/N community and may have lost another.
I doubt there is a single soylenter that saw this "article" and isn't shaking their heads saying "What The Fuck?"
Impeach Donald Saruman and his sidekick Elon Sauron
(Score: 4, Insightful) by cafebabe on Saturday August 30 2014, @02:18PM
Close. I thought: "That looks like a hornet's nest. I'll let 'em rant at the top [of the thread] and try seeding it with some reasonable discussion."
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(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Sunday August 31 2014, @01:20AM
I imagined most of the audience here with bewildered and disappointed looks on their faces, almost exactly like those in the audience after the Pacers-Pistons [youtube.com] brawl.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @02:41PM
Exactly.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by AlHunt on Saturday August 30 2014, @02:19PM
It's as old as computers themselves - "Garbage In - Garbage Out". As I type this, there are 8 submissions in the queue.
Pretty much everyone can agree this submission (well, the commentary attached to it) should never have seen the light of day and most of the comments, including this one, are off-topic.
It looks like UIDs are up in the 4,000's. If only 5% of those are active users, and those users will commit to submitting 1 decent story a week, the garbage submissions will be buried in a crapstorm of great stuff.
I'm guilty. I want an alternative to the Brand X site and I have not done my part by submitting consistently.
Today, I submitted something and commit to do at least 1 each week. You are all hereby challenged to do the same.
If you want a better community, you have to be part of it.
(Score: 2) by Fnord666 on Saturday August 30 2014, @05:01PM
The problem is that the way things are supposed to go is
and in this case there was(presumably) a failure in the editing stage. Without the editing I might as well be reading Reddit.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by evilviper on Saturday August 30 2014, @07:48PM
There was a poll some time ago... Readers voted for fewer stories per-day. SN staff decided to disregard the results and publish more frequent stories (even as some get practically no comments), emptying the queue faster, and spreading discussion more thinly.
Editors reject plenty of decent stories, too... If they chose to save up the stories they don't happen to need right away, they could go back and dig through the reject queue when the selection is getting thin. Hell, all they need is the submitted link... They can just copy a representative paragraph from the source as the "summary" here.
SN's demonstrated aversion to hard science and lower-level technology stories, despite my repeated prodding, while selecting non-nerdy political flamebait this crap, dramatically reduces my interest in trying to contribute.
Hydrogen cyanide is a delicious and necessary part of the human diet.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Lagg on Saturday August 30 2014, @02:25PM
Unlike most people when there is submitter opinion in the summaries I actually like it because let's not lie to ourselves, every single thing that is submitted here is going to have an element of opinion to it and sometimes what the submitter has to say is interesting. But in this case I think that this should have been removed and again since I usually love the submitter opinions this is not something said lightly. I also take offense to the implication that everyone who likes guns is diseased. I really expect better of someone who submits articles to a site like this who should understand why well engineered devices are very enjoyable to people like us and also understand why you shouldn't let politics interfere with that.
Plus on top of that the submitter kind of screwed up his own point in two sentences.
Then proceeds to rant about gun hobbyists being a disease and other such nonsense. I know the general response to people who yell "HEY GAIS I'M LEAVING THE SITE" is to ignore and deride them but in this case it would probably be wise to take it as an indicator.
http://lagg.me [lagg.me] 🗿
(Score: 2) by Marand on Sunday August 31 2014, @01:18AM
I actually have no problem with opinions being attached along with the submissions, but the more opinion you allow into it, the less professional the submission looks, especially in a case like this, where it's nothing but opinion and rant with no substance.
What I would love to see is a second text area on the submission page for submitter commentary. Basically, you have the article submission itself, which should be written in a mostly neutral POV with stricter guidelines for good writing. Some light snark or humour as appropriate, but nothing excessively nasty; definitely no nastier than The Register would be, probably less so. This field would be subject to heavy editor slash-and-burn to meet guidelines, including merging multiple submissions and complete gutting of the content if necessary.
Things like the internet-soapbox ranting today would belong in the commentary section. This part would have no editing, would appear along with the story, but would not appear on the main page. Preferably it would appear as its own comment, subject to moderation, so that it can be downmodded if it's complete garbage.
Basically, the article submitter would get a free "first post", maybe have it tagged slightly differently ("Submitter Commentary" or something). As an extra bonus it might discourage the "frist psot" type crap because there's already a comment to jump-start conversations.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by dcollins on Saturday August 30 2014, @03:23PM
One of my primary griefs with Slashdot is that it's mostly overrun with libertarian ditto-heads on issues like economics, unions, single-payer health care, equality for women and minorities, guns, etc. When it started I was hoping that Soylent would have more informed commentary in regards to political issues; but have been pretty turned off in the last few weeks by it turning into the same, or worse, echo-chamber (such that I've been considering striking it from my bookmarks).
If Soylent sets forward an explicit political philosophy that distinguishes it from Slashdot, such that it flushes out the right wingers (as seems to be the case based on a lot of comments in this thread), then that will be delightful and quite likely give it more legs in the long run.
(Score: 2) by dcollins on Saturday August 30 2014, @03:26PM
Post-strikeout-edit: Oh, well, so much for that (sigh).
(Score: 2) by Marand on Sunday August 31 2014, @01:37AM
I don't think the problem was that the submitter commentary failed to match echo-chamber expectations; it was problematic because it was poorly written and completely off-topic, and would have been modded down as off-topic if it had been in a separate comment.
For example, myself: I like seeing discussion from different sources and different opinions, including ones I'd never agree with, because it encourages critical thinking, but there was nothing of that in the submission. It was irrelevant, off-topic, and tainted a story that could have sparked some interesting discussion. Thanks to the submission's soapbox-hobo style ranting, we lost the opportunity to have insightful discussion on TFA itself, because everyone focused on the submission itself being a mess.
If it had been written better, and attached to a submission that it would be on-topic for, I would have had no problem with the submitter's opinions being expressed, regardless of whether I agree or not. I do, however, think SN should provide some kind of separation of article submission and submitter commentary during the submission process, with the commentary part being subject to moderation and not shown as part of the front-page.
(Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 30 2014, @03:41PM
So let me see if I understand this correctly. You want all the people whose opinions you don't like chased off so that you don't get the echo chamber effect.
No, wait, I think I have it! You want your own echo chamber! Like Huffington Post! Or Kuro5hin! Or maybe the Village Voice! Or Mother Jones! Or, these days, MSNBC! CNN!
Maybe you'd also like lots of click-bait ending in stupid rhetorical questions such as: "The article submitter seems very sure of the case, but what do you think?" as if nobody would ever post a comment without it.
Because heaven forbid you actually ever think about why people who disagree with you, do so.
(Score: 2) by tathra on Saturday August 30 2014, @05:53PM
the word "winger" more implies extremism; you know, the kind of people who don't actually want to have a debate and don't care about facts, and only want to push their agenda no matter what. those are the people who drive off actual discussion and forcibly change places into echo chambers, because its impossible to have a discussion when nobody's listening.
i don't want insane people from any end of the political spectrum to take up "ownership" of the site. this place needs to stay firmly in the middle, open to all ideas.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by CyprusBlue on Saturday August 30 2014, @03:43PM
It's hardly an echo chamber when 80% of the comments on the story are flaming the editor who let this idiocy through.
(Score: 1) by lrmo on Saturday August 30 2014, @06:06PM
The editor's note only appears when you are logged in of clicked on the story. I've tried in several browsers and AC always see the original, unaltered story.
(Score: 3, Informative) by cafebabe on Saturday August 30 2014, @07:25PM
That's an artifact of HTTP session cookies and caching. Normally, the situation resolves itself but perhaps the caches should be flushed when an important update is published?
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 31 2014, @06:38AM
Many school shootings are never ever covered. Why? They involve Black male students shooting other (gang rival) Black male students, in one-two-three dead casualty cases. Other famous mass shootings involve "sudden non-White rage" syndrome: the Montreal Shooting by Marc Lepine curiously never referred to by his real name: Gamil Rodrigue Liass Gharbi, born to a (White) Canadian mother and Algerian father. Or Black Supremacist Colin Ferguson (yes he was Black) shouting anti-White slurs as he shot only Whites. Or Navy Yard DC shooter Aaron Alexis (doing the same, shouting anti-White slurs while only shooting Whites). Or the SCE shooter Andre Turner (also Black) who shot and killed only Asians and Whites while shouting anti-White slurs. There is the infamous case of Ali Mohammed Brown (another Black man, a convert to Islam) arrested in Seattle for shooting two gay (White) men and who is claiming (credibly) he shot two others. There is the case of the Wichita massacre by the Carr Brothers (also Black) who raped and murdered five people and tried to murder (and raped) a sixth (she survived by playing dead). Yes the victims were all Whites.
I could go on and on and on.
You might just as well say that BLACK MEN are responsible for shootings as gun owners, they are far disproportionately represented in both the one-two-three victim class gang shootings at schools and mass shootings at workplaces. Yes White guys form the majority of such shooters (workplace/commute places) but Black MEN are far over-represented.
You could argue with more logic and facts on your side, that Black men ought to be monitored and incarcerated on the least infraction until they are too old to commit murder -- the same principal applies. And the market for guns is a market driven by the failure of the government (to lock up a certain party's voters and voting relatives) who disproportionately are mass shooters. Aaron Alexis got disappeared down the memory hole, save for those thoughtful people who understand partisan politics mean that the government will only clean up the bodies afterwards, and send victims survivors the bill.
Yes, gun ownership is a function of failure to control or stop Black male violence, which is taboo, not discussed, but very real and the elephant in the room.
Franz Fanon and Malcolm X, both born to White mothers and Black fathers, fantasized about killing a White guy at random to "purge their White Blood" and both claimed to have done so. Barack Obama in Dreams from My Father: A STORY OF RACE AND INHERITANCE says he empathized with that feeling and had it himself. This attitude is fairly endemic in the Black community, indeed it is celebrated. So lots and lots of Whites want equalizers. Particularly since guys like Colin Ferguson and Aaron Alexis (both Black supremacists) are armed themselves.
Getting rid of guns is like getting rid of marijuana, alcohol, cigarettes, pornography, and other moral crusades. Doomed to failure because of human nature. As long as Black men are very violent and prone to go on shooting/killing rampages, potential victims will want guns. Want a disarmed population like Japan? Make it a peaceful mono-ethno state with EXTREME social control and uniform behavior.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by francois.barbier on Sunday August 31 2014, @02:07PM
Thank you for keeping the paragraph. However, it's hard to read a whole paragraph with line-through.
Could you add this to you CSS for the future?
del:hover { text-decoration: none; }
This removes the line-though when the mouse hovers the paragraph.
Thanks !
(Score: 1) by jon3k on Sunday August 31 2014, @02:08PM
Soylent keeps getting more bizarre and editors keep putting more and more editorial bullshit into the posts. I come her for news not your wacked out fucking opinions. Either keep it to yourself or I'll go somewhere else.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Sunday August 31 2014, @03:43PM
It was not the editors' opinion - it was the submitter's. That said, it shouldn't have been there, we have apologized and deleted the offending text, and we are conducting an inquiry to find out how it got through our procedures and checks.
I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by iWantToKeepAnon on Sunday August 31 2014, @08:07PM
"Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." -- Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy