German Columbine

[Shi Huangdi]

Originally posted by Guynemer
Christ on a pogo stick, people! Isn't it a little early to start scoring little political points with this, pro-gun or anti-gun, zero-tolerance or not zero-tolerance, ad naseum? Honestly, I expected better out of some of you.

I agree with you. But then, I also remember back during the Columbine shootings some European posters immediatly began gun control ranting and saying this happened due to US lax gun laws. I suspect some of the anti-gun control people on this thread remember that too.

I didn't know you at the time of the Columbine Shooting, so I don't know what you would have done on this forum.

Anyway, the danger these killings pose are overblown. There are so many more things that pose a greater danger-- Car accidents, alcohol, drugs, gangs and others kill far more. While these killings are done in a much more spectacular and dramatic fashion, that does not warrant further opression against an already opressed group of people.

[Dr Strangelove]

I might point out that in the time period that Germany had one mass school shooting, we here in the US have had more than a half dozen. It would appear that something is driving the higher rate od violence in the US.

Some of these guys seem to have some twisted notion of ganing a sort of fame from their actions. Maybe Andy Warhol is our problem.

[OzzyKP]

Originally posted by Dr Strangelove
I might point out that in the time period that Germany had one mass school shooting, we here in the US have had more than a half dozen. It would appear that something is driving the higher rate od violence in the US.

Some of these guys seem to have some twisted notion of ganing a sort of fame from their actions. Maybe Andy Warhol is our problem.

Scroll up to read my explanation for school shootings. No one has addressed it yet.

[Spiffor]

Ozzy :
I mostly agree with you. I don't think it's the only cause of violence, but alienation sure is one of the biggest causes of violence. Not only in Erfurt, but in a more general point of view as well.

[Ecthy]

Noone evr said guns are banned, but at least there is such a thing as gun control.

This guy was a member of a shooting club (modern form of archery/marksmanship thing, you get the idea), and he had official permits t oown those weapons. BTW, we distinguish between permits to own and permits to use weapons.

[Spiffor]

That's pretty much the same in the eyes of an assassin. BTW there are more and more massacres of this kind in Europe. Maybe our gun control is unsufficient.
For example : you may have a weapon in your baggage if you're going to your shooting club. That's impossible for a cop to know if it's true, even if you get controlled.
Maybe the weapons should stay in the shooting club, locked with 2 keys ?

[Ecthy]

more and more?

[Spiffor]

In France, you had the Nanterre massacre 1 month ago : a madman from a shooting club killed 8 people in the city-council.
2 weeks ago, an alcoholic almost did a massacre in a police staion with a Kalashnikov. He was dead after killing one policeman. I'm not aware of semi-massacres in other European countries (of course, Erfurt was the most important news yesterday in France), but I'm sure worried by the turn of events.

[Ecthy]

fair enough, well it seems there is a hostage taking incident going on right now, so make that another one

[Shi Huangdi]

Read the paper today and it's article on the massacre. This was no outcast doing this massacre. People around the school were shocked, they said they didn't have the image of him as someone who would do this. They said he was loud, talkative, had lots of friends, and went to parties. The massacre was aimed at the administration and the teachers primarily. You were wrong to automatically assume this was an outcast.

Should we start profiling popular people now?

[OzzyKP]

Originally posted by Shi Huangdi
Read the paper today and it's article on the massacre. This was no outcast doing this massacre. People around the school were shocked, they said they didn't have the image of him as someone who would do this. They said he was loud, talkative, had lots of friends, and went to parties. The massacre was aimed at the administration and the teachers primarily. You were wrong to automatically assume this was an outcast.

Should we start profiling popular people now?

My point wasn't that he was an outcast. Being an outcast doesn't necessarily have to do with it (it certainly makes things worse) but just being young does. The system (for the most part) oppresses all young people equally. I think the popularity of this murderer is shown by the targets he chose. In Columbine the murderers were outcasts so they shot the popular students they felt bullied them. In this case he wasn't bullied or oppressed by his fellow students but more directly by the system, so he almost exclusively murdered teachers.

Oppression has a way of acting in a chain. If you look at the American South pre-civil rights, the most racist whites were poor whites. They had less respect and ability than wealthy whites so sought to better their position by putting down blacks. This is how it always works, Group A oppressed Group B, so Group B finds a scapegoat to oppress. This is how it works in schools among youth. The 'system' (teachers, parents, government, etc) oppresses all youth, rather than settle with just being oppressed the jocks, preps, whoever, seek to alieviate their situation somewhat by manuevering themselves into the middle of the chain rather than the bottom, so they start bullying their fellow students, the outcasts.

This chain gets even more complex than this. In middle school my friends and I were in the middle spot among students, we would get picked on by certain groups of students and we would pick on other groups of students. It is a shameful thing I have done, but it is what happens when you are in a system of oppression.

When someone is in this system of oppression every once in a while they will snap and have enough of it and they will strike back against their oppressors. In Columbine they struck back against the popular kids, in Germany he struck back at his teachers.

[Tom201]

Hm.
From my experience in various German Schools, I cant say that the system is opressive (at least not in the strict sense). About 3 of 4 teachers I meet are trying there best to educate the youth (the 4th just trys to get the time by and collect the money ). The guy in question was thrown out of school cose he falsified documents. Much more isnt known.
Maybe I missunderstood your argument.

[OzzyKP]

Well I can't comment directly on German schools, I have never seen one and I don't know anything about them. I do know however that the American system of schooling is based on the Prussian model, and it is my opinion that American schools are oppressive.

Teachers themselves are very good people, they get into the profession with an honest desire to teach the next generation. But when they are placed in a system of Compulsory Education then they cease to be good natured educators and become authority figures whose job requires them to control the actions of students. The rage of the shooter was probably misdirected and didn't address the root causes of his oppression, but he was driven to rage and no doubt wasn't drawing the same rational conclusions I am. Of course mass shootings aren't rational methods for combating an evil system in the first place.

I am about to take off now (i'll be back in an hour or two) so if you want a very good look at the problems with our schools pick up a book by John Taylor Gatto or John C. Holt. Both are educators (Gatto was voted teacher of the year in New York City for 3 years and teacher of the year in New York State for one year) and both believe that a system of Compulsory Schooling is not only harmful to young people but harmful to the process of education.

Gatto proves that despite noble goals, schools spend more of their time trying to control behavior than acutally teaching anything. When authority tries to control your behavior that is oppression. The very fact that it is compulsory is oppresive. I'm not sure if school is still compulsory in Germany, but here if you don't go to school you break the law and there are penalties associated with it. Being forced against your will to go to a school for 10 years out of your life is slavery and nothing but.

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Faeelin
I thought guns were banned in Germany?

It's funny that the two recent mass shootings in Europe were both performed with legally-owned weapons. All the trolls that came out to play can now back under their rocks, please.

[Tom201]

I'm not sure if school is still compulsory in Germany, but here if you don't go to school you break the law and there are penalties associated with it

When I translated "compulsory" right, yes. Everyone has to go to school in Germany and can be enforced by the police. But you can decide to quit with 14 or older on your own, bevor that you need the aproval of your parents.

Gatto proves that despite noble goals, schools spend more of their time trying to control behavior than acutally teaching anything. When authority tries to control your behavior that is oppression.

Depends what exactly is meant with control of behavior.
If this is about "dont disturb the teachers speech" or something on that lines, I dont see anything wrong with it.
If it is about military camp like behavior and school uniforms, I agree.