Re: Not always joking, it seems

"John Schilling" <schillin@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote
> On Sat, 16 Feb 2008 19:39:36 GMT, "Karl Johanson" 
> <karljohanson@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>
>>It can go lots of ways. ...he's suicidal and/or psychotic, so he 
>>shoots
>>anyway. 100 people start firing their shot guns at the stage. Some are
>>bad shots, some are only good shots when they aren't full of adrenalin
>>(and these are side arms, not sniper rifles). Some audience members 
>>are
>>hit. Students in the hall hear hundreds of gunshots and burst into the
>>room with their sidearms, looking to put an end to whatever nastiness 
>>is
>>going on in the auditorium. Some shoot at the shooters in the audience
>>(seeing the hamburgered guy on stage, and lots of screaming and 
>>bleeding
>>audience members). Students in the audience shoot back, thinking the
>>ones who came from the hall might be with the guy they shot on stage.
>
> Is this truly how you expect you would react yourself, if for whatever
> reason you happened to be carrying a gun?

No, but I'm moderately well trained in firearms use. And I don't suggest 
every one would, or would in every case. As I said, "it can go lots of 
ways".

> You'd shoot into a crowd, in the general direction of a villain, even
> as other armed men and women have a clear field of fire to engage him
> without risk to bystanders?

Above, I mentioned the *possibility* that some might shoot at those 
shooting from the crowd, not that they'd shoot at the guy already shot 
from hundreds of audience members.

My point is that when untrained people see others firing guns, and don't 
know 'who started it', I don't expect they'll always act in an optimal 
way (especially if their adrenal gland is working over time).

> And then shoot any armed man who came to
> the scene of the crime, on the grounds that he might be in cahoots 
> with
> the original villain?  Or, if you weren't there from the start, you'd
> respond to the sound of gunfire by ru****ng in and shooting every armed
> man you saw?

> Interesting.  Where do you live again?

I used to live next door to people who were making some French fries. 
They left the oil heating and went into their back yard to play soccer. 
The oil caught fire. While the 12 year old among them got a garden hose, 
the other dozen or so people there ran around in circles (literally). 
Some people don't react well to unusual cir***stance. (One of them 
turned off the power to the kitchen from the breakers in their ground 
floor, at my suggestion.)

Karl Johanson