[🔓 UNlocked. ] Breaking: Mass shooting on MSU campus
Listening to the scanner. Multiple victims in Berkey hall. Police searching the union building.
[🔒 Locked @2am, pending full inspection Tuesday morning. More info in mod sticky thread.---rob f]
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[Unlocked @9:05 am.
My thoughts this morning are that we can---and will---have a discussion that won't again go back off the rails. After all, the vast majority of us on the MGoBoard are totally capable of having a thoughtful, mature discussion (and prove so on a regular basis).
OTOH, if anyone chooses instead to troll this now-unlocked thread, they'll likely join the three who sidelined themselves last night.
What happened last night on the MSU campus is way beyond tragic. We shouldn't pretend here that it didn't happen. And it shouldn't be "swept under the rug" because of the poor behavior of a few who abuse the privilege of having an MGoAccount.
Instead, we should all be given the opportunity to express here our sympathies, our prayers, our support to those who are today mourning in the aftermath of last night's events.
-rob f]
February 13th, 2023 at 8:46 PM ^
Police calling it a "mass casualty incident". Calling paramedics from cities all around Lansing.
Confirmed 1 DOA now. Unknown how many other victims. Still searching for gun man.
February 14th, 2023 at 12:53 AM ^
Suspect reported as dead from self inflicted gun shot wound
February 14th, 2023 at 10:19 AM ^
Every time this happens, it’s heartbreaking to watch. To now know a victim, it’s paralyzing. I’m nauseous. I know the parents well and I’m brought to tears for them. My kids know that victim and their pain is leaving me broken even more. When it’s so easy to get guns and nobody cares enough to do anything about it, how do you ever help them move on with the notion of feeling safe anywhere.
Mrs. 93 works in family resilience, so we’re (once again) helping a community rally and cope. It shouldn’t be like this. It’s largely preventable (no place is 100% safe - living is inherently risky - but what we accept in the US is embarrassing). Please, please, please take a hard look at how your own actions support or even just tacitly accept gun violence. How you vote, what you own, how you contribute to your communities before to prevent and after to cope from such events. We have to change this.
February 13th, 2023 at 8:49 PM ^
please please please let everyone in east lansing go home to their loved ones tonight
praying for those already impacted
February 14th, 2023 at 1:16 AM ^
Thanks homie. I was right in the middle of it without actually knowing exactly what ‘I’m in the middle of it was’ at the time.
February 14th, 2023 at 10:53 AM ^
Glad you are safe. Scary stuff.
How this has become a unique American experience is so disappointing.
February 13th, 2023 at 8:51 PM ^
Horrible news
WTF IS WRONG WITH PEOPLE!!!
February 13th, 2023 at 9:03 PM ^
When you normalize violence, violence becomes normal.
February 13th, 2023 at 9:23 PM ^
And when you respond to it with nothing more than empty "thoughts and prayers" it gets worse.
It's not a mental health care issue; all countries have that. But only this country, in all of the developed world, has anything close to this level of gun carnage.
February 13th, 2023 at 9:31 PM ^
What always gets me is the blaming of video games, music, TV and movies
February 13th, 2023 at 9:36 PM ^
It's Marilyn Manson's fault
February 13th, 2023 at 10:11 PM ^
Yup, which all Western countries have, but not the murder rates.
February 13th, 2023 at 9:33 PM ^
Yep. All of our elected leaders have failed us.
February 13th, 2023 at 9:36 PM ^
Just the ones blocking reform, really. Well, and SCOTUS, which is even more insane than usual on this issue.
February 13th, 2023 at 9:45 PM ^
Michigan actually has the correct make-up in its state government (Democrats control every wing of govt) to get gun control legislation passed. Problem is it would get held up in the courts in perpetuity until the slanted SCOTUS inevitably strikes it down.
February 14th, 2023 at 10:46 AM ^
I hear you, but it should be crafted and passed even if it will eventually be struck down. Learn from the Bruen case. Don't make arbitrary "may-issue" standards. If nothing else, it will help the next state craft legislation that won't be struck down.
February 14th, 2023 at 11:41 AM ^
I’d like to know what percentage of “ban guns” voters would also be in favor of long prison sentences for those caught illegally possessing them. It seems to me there’s likely a large overlap between those in favor of bans and those who oppose what they like to call “mass incarceration.”
February 14th, 2023 at 11:53 AM ^
This is a very good point. Leave the gun laws just like they are and make it a life sentence to illegally possess one. My guess is that a lot of the problem would take care of itself then.
February 13th, 2023 at 9:45 PM ^
I'm not interested in absolving a political party of blame when this has been happening in this country decades.
February 14th, 2023 at 12:48 AM ^
If someone wants a gun to hurt people... 9 times out of 10 they either steal it or buy it off the street from someone. Normal human beings are not going out and buying guns to kill people. People really need to stop with this gun reform crap because Criminals/Bad People do not care about gun reform
February 14th, 2023 at 9:27 AM ^
Then why do we outlaw murder when it is not going to stop Criminals/Bad People???
February 14th, 2023 at 9:58 AM ^
Aren't there already gun laws? You can't own anything you want right? semi automatic vs full automatic. I just don't understand why we can't further look at gun restrictions.
Making certain weapons harder to obtain and doing backround checks all seem like common sense laws. I believe you can't have certain weapons if you have committed certain crimes or have certain criminal past, so there are laws. Further looking at laws and making changes based on here and now, is what the founding fathers set the system up to do.
February 14th, 2023 at 11:32 AM ^
The problem is that the guns are out there. Confiscation is not going to happen. So while it may seem like talking about guns is “focusing on the problem,” it is actually talking about the one aspect of the problem that isn’t going to change.
The real conversation is “the guns are out there, what do we do now?”
February 14th, 2023 at 1:08 PM ^
I think there are still plenty of options. We can restrict new guns that have been used in most types of these shootings (i'll admit I don't know all the nuances when it comes to this, but understand that the assault type of rifles are specifically developed for close combat and allow for "bump" stocks which I beleive allows for higher rounds to be held in a magazine that can be quickly reloaded).
Any transactions of existing guns of these types should be monitored and registered, just like my car is registered (i.e. can't be anonymous selling at a gun show).
This might not be the right answer, but something along these lines that could make sense. It may do nothing to help reduce mass shootings, but at least we are trying something. They have become too common place to say that there is nothing we can at least try to do.
February 14th, 2023 at 1:31 PM ^
It doesn’t address the millions that are already out there. And this shooting could have been done with any gun. It is a red herring, a political talking point, not a real discussion of why this is happening.
February 14th, 2023 at 5:04 PM ^
"Assault" rifles are nothing more than semi-automatics. The vast majority of guns (handguns and rifles) are semi-automatic, i.e., one bullet is fired per one trigger pull. If you banned all semi-automatics, there isn't much left to adequately protect yourself from any threat. Being able to carry is the only thing that kept me from being beaten to a pulp when leaving my business with cash on a nightly basis.
Bump stocks are independent of magazine capacity. Bump stocks use the rifle's mass during recoil to reduce time between trigger pulls, which increases your firing rate. Bump stocks are illegal.
Magazines and/or clips have also been limited in capacity. Let's say you are sitting in a deer blind and your rifle jams, how many bullets from your 9mm handgun will it take to drop a black bear charging you? Seven? Eight? Most handgun clips hold 10 rounds. Don't miss.
Vendors cannot anonymously sell a gun at a gun show. They must adhere to state laws. State laws require appropriate background checks, registration, and licensing for handguns. Individuals can attend and barter and trade just as they can barter and trade anywhere (the streets, online). Unregistered gun show sales are far less common than you think. I have only seen a few "sideline sales" in the many gun shows I have attended.
The vast majority of these mass killers have never taken a gun class. They do not have a CCP. They've never hunted. They are mentally ill. They have exhibited numerous warning signs. They mostly obtain the gun illegally. This shooter checked all of these boxes. This is a VERY difficult problem to solve.
February 14th, 2023 at 6:11 PM ^
I don’t think you are commenting in good faith. There is a difference in specifying an assault tactical rifle vs semi automatics. If there isn’t a difference then I don’t know why would need assault rifles, since those are redundant to a much more convenient hand gun. So you would be for a ban of assault rifles as they don’t serve a different purpose. If you can distinguish that there are guns that are much more efficient at mass shootings and killing humans, the. We can still have a discussion about smartly addressing those.
in regards to bears in the woods, I’m not trying to take your semi automatic away, but most of my friends bring a 6 shot double action revolver instead of their 9 shot semi automatic hand guns. Not sure if that 3 bullet difference is that big a deal.
im willing to have a discussion, but if all you bring are straw man arguments, and no solution, then you are accepting that you don’t want to find a solution and are alright with the shootings.
February 14th, 2023 at 7:09 PM ^
Nobody is “alright” with the shootings, but the idea that you can “take away the guns” is, in itself, a straw man. There is no possible way you can constitutionally confiscated personal property from somebody who has committed no crime, and the fact of the matter is that IT DOES amount to punishing one person for the deeds of another.
My mind does not even go to “gun control” in the wake of these incidents. It isn’t about the guns. It is about a sick, rotting culture and the erosion of family and non-existent social fabric. And this is from a person who hates guns. A person hellbent on carrying out a mass shooting is going to find a gun to do it with. It can’t be legislated away. They can pass whatever tough sounding legislation they want, it will keep happening until this country starts to repair itself, and look at the actual issues leading to this and not using guns and a cop-out.
February 13th, 2023 at 9:51 PM ^
A certain subset has. The only way you get to the current jurisprudence of the second amendment is to completely ignore what the Founders believed about what they were doing - which is to say, when originalism and original public meaning - the right’s preferred method of constitutional interpretation - does not produce the results that they want, they throw it out. It’s how you get judges striking down laws banning people with domestic violence restraining orders against them from accessing their guns because those types of laws were not common in 1787 or when the 14A was ratified.
February 14th, 2023 at 1:34 AM ^
Bullshit. It's a mental health issue. If it's not guns, it'll be knives, hammers, gas, fire, chemicals...you name it.
Or the really sane people just use bombs.
February 14th, 2023 at 9:31 AM ^
Except that if you ban knives, hammers, etc... the world economy would come to a stop. If you ban guns, the world would hardly even notice. Guns only do one thing, kill people. It has no other use and almost every industrialized countries live without it in their daily lives.
This kind of thing keeps happening because we allow it to happen. We have no one to blame but ourselves.
February 14th, 2023 at 9:42 AM ^
Guns only do one thing, kill people.
I guess I've been missing the point legally hunting and target shooting with mine.
February 14th, 2023 at 10:04 AM ^
Proving my point that banning guns would do absolutely nothing to our economy unlike knives and cars that NRA always points out.
What you are pointing out are entertainment. We are allowing this to happen just so that some of us get a kick out shooting up stuff.
I love my Xbox, but I would be first one to call to ban it if it was blowing up randomly killing thousands of people every year. And trust me, I use it far more than you hunting or target shooting.
February 14th, 2023 at 12:23 PM ^
You may think it proved your point but that just further shows you missed mine completely. You made a concrete statement which is just flat out wrong. I even quoted you to show what I was responding to. Feel free to pontificate further if it makes you feel better but when you state something subjectively, you should be prepared to be called out for it.
Let me be clear, I realize we have an issue in this country and something should most definitely be done to address the issue.
February 14th, 2023 at 11:14 AM ^
Ban guns completely, worldwide? And that means stripping military and law enforcement personnel as well as criminals.. Good luck. Irresponsible and mentally ill people kill people. It should be treated as such.
I'm not in favor of burning books, banning the internet, or taking people's right to bear arms away. However, I'm completely in favor of amending the current laws. It's far too easy to own a gun and I do think there are far too many weapons available that have no sensible purpose.
February 14th, 2023 at 1:10 PM ^
Given the choice, I'd take my chances against someone with a knife or a hammer vs someone with an assault type rifle that can hold large amounts of rounds and easy to reload.
Of course, I may be having a Whoosh moment and missing a sarcastic joke. Might not be the appropriate forum for that though.
February 14th, 2023 at 1:24 PM ^
Yeah, just head on down to Cabela's and pick yourself up a ready-made bomb! Nice and easy. The reason these people don't use bombs, is because 1) the materials are hard to get because we have restricted access to them, esp after 9/11 (interestingly, we did NOT restrict access to assault weapons) and 2) if you want to make one from household materials, it's pretty hard and very dangerous. What is easy to get and not as risky? AR-15s.
If you were going to kill a ton of people at a say a music festival, you would have to go through all that trouble to work with dangerous chemicals to build a bomb. Or you could try and start a fire. Or you could try to kill dozens of people with a knife or hammer. So, what's your best option? AR-15.
February 14th, 2023 at 6:33 PM ^
I'd love to see the Venn diagram of those that say "It's a mental health issue" and those that don't want their tax dollar spent on mental health programs.
February 14th, 2023 at 10:13 AM ^
The analogy I always use is: America's mental health problem is a puddle of gasoline. And our gun problem is a lit match. They're both potentially dangerous on their own, but put them together and we have a major problem.
February 14th, 2023 at 12:14 PM ^
Likewise, if you mix alcohol with America's mental health problem there's a high likelihood of a bad outcome. But aren't there responsible and mentally stable people that consume alcohol? Should we prohibit alcohol nonetheless?
We can't simply ban everything because of a small percentage of individuals that honestly need mental health care. We can change the current laws however to make it more difficult for those said individuals to acquire the means to harm others and better understand why they do so, no matter what method they choose to kill people.
February 14th, 2023 at 12:57 PM ^
I'll take my chances letting a local person suffering from mental health problems have a fifth of whiskey rather than a gun.
And we're not talking about banning all guns. We're talking about increasing access to mental health care while also restricting gun ownership to responsible, mentally-healthy adults. And we're talking about banning assault weapons. Not all guns.
February 14th, 2023 at 5:13 PM ^
Until that mentally ill person pumped up on whiskey drives their car through a parade.
February 13th, 2023 at 9:37 PM ^
Violence is normal. It has been with humanity for at least 150,000 years.
Edit: Truth hurts apparently. Denial that violence is a part of being human isn’t helpful to any attempt at seeking solutions.
February 13th, 2023 at 9:53 PM ^
Mass shootings of innocent people is not normal.
February 13th, 2023 at 10:04 PM ^
Mass killing of humans is normal. Humans have done it since time immemorial. They have found mass graves of people from 15,000 years ago who clearly were subjected to lethal levels of violence.
Saying that mass killing is normal is not the same as saying that we should do nothing. I desperately want it to stop. We must do take action.
But in order to begin to address a problem you first have to be honest. Males in particular have to be as we are the source of almost all violence and have been so since time immemorial. This is one area where the genders are distinctly unequal.
February 13th, 2023 at 11:54 PM ^
Normal or something that's happened throughout time? Because women and girls have been raped as an act of war throughout time, too. Would you use the word normal to describe that?
February 14th, 2023 at 10:24 AM ^
It really comes across like you're downplaying these acts of violence when you do this. ANd you do it a lot, also in regards to slavery and conquest. And while you're not wrong, it also makes you sound like you're brushing off this insane, senseless violence because it's part of our human history and DNA. But, I mean, we live in a modern world in 2023 and we shouldn't hold ourselves to the standards of prehistoric man or Genghis Khan or King Leopold.
February 14th, 2023 at 2:12 PM ^
He IS wrong though, it's just that the devil is in the details. Most people don't have the patience to parse it out with him. People like him count on that when making their intellectually dishonest arguments, and he's always so certain that he's the one who is correct, while almost literally everyone else must be wrong.
February 14th, 2023 at 2:11 PM ^
You are such a cherry picking phony. Yes, mass killings have happened for thousands of years. Of course. You're conveniently ignoring the fact that they have not historically been carried out by private individuals, who are unhappy with their lives. Historically, it has been political, or tribal, conquests, etc.
Can you make an honest argument even one time? I don't think I've seen one yet from you.
February 14th, 2023 at 4:31 PM ^
I don’t care what’s “normal” We as a society get to decide what is acceptable. THIS is NOT.