On 2008-02-16 10:53:43 -0800, Aaron Denney <wnoise@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> said:
> ["Followup-To:" header set to rec.arts.sf.fandom.]
> On 2008-02-16, Kurt Busiek <kurt@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>> On 2008-02-16 10:02:54 -0800, "Keith F. Lynch" <kfl@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
said:
>>
>>> <Willie.Mookie@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>>>> Matthias Warkus <War...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>>>>> Note this has been said about the last two generations already.
>>>>> "Generation X" came out in 1989, after all.
>>>
>>>> The shooter was of those generations.
>>>
>>> The only noteworthy thing about this latest shooting is how much news
>>> coverage it and similar shootings get. About the same number of
>>> Americans are killed by cars in the average *hour*, and nobody carries
>>> on about that. Or about people who drown in their bathtubs, or die
>>> in chainsaw accidents, or are electrocuted when changing a lightbulb.
>>> But whenever some homicidal nut acts out with a firearm, suddenly
>>> Something Must Be Done.
>>
>> Clearly, we should rank deliberate mass murder alongside cumulative
>> accidental death groupings.
>
> In terms of public policy decisions and risk management? Well, yes.
>
>> Highway fatalities as the result of multiple accidents are the same
>> thing as one guy with guns setting out to kill people.
>
> No, they're not the same thing, but dead is dead.
Sure. People who die of old age are dead, too.
But I can still understand why people don't equate accidental death
with natural death, or either with getting gunned down in school.
It's possible to recognize that driving automobiles carries risk
without pretending that mass murder isn't "noteworthy."
kdb
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