It is extremely difficult to understand the rationale, if any, behind terror attacks. All terror attacks are the sick acts of deranged, if perversely lucid, people who feel impotent against the society they live in or they unwittingly fight for.
The Norway massacre by this young, pleasant looking monster is particularly horrible because it doesn't seem at first glance to have any explanation or justification, twisted or not. Unfortunately, it is as sickly rational, from a sick mind point of view, as any other terrorist attack.
Historians and intellectuals, fearful of the risk of repeating past atrocities (always perpetrated for the good of humanity of course) have been warning the West's progressives not to push their agendas to their extreme consequences lest they obtain the opposite of what they theoretically wished onto their citizens (racism, concentration camps, deportations, ethnic cleansing); but power, greed and corruption have muddled the original issues and molded them into perfect demagoguery material. The result? Uncontrolled immigration to the detriment (and often discrimination) of the indigenous population for the purpose of creating voting blocks, welfare and all sorts of entitlements to create dependence and passivity and of course more votes, misguided multiculturalism to appease violent minorities, betrayal of hard won ideals (to the point of harsh anti-Semitism, in Norway) for the sake of security, promotion of extreme relativism to undermine societies' institutions, etc., etc., etc..
In a normal democracy, these agendas are eventually moderated through political dialogue or die of their own, either when people see the lies behind the policies or when the nanny state runs out of money. Norway, on the contrary, could afford to drown their citizens in entitlements, accommodate and subsidize fresh immigration and at the same time lull everybody into a false sense of security, thanks to its oil wealth.
Such a state of things eventually creates social conflicts which in normal circumstances generate a healthy, at least in the name of democratic choice, shift in politics and nothing more; as seen recently in most of Europe, including Norway. On the other hand, more serious and dangerous effects are produced on the weakest, or sickest, take your pick, minds. To these, the continuous exposure to such social contradictions exasperates their sense of betrayal, oppression, impotence, producing a desire to sow the horror we have sadly often witnessed, as a lesson, a message, a warning or a cry of desperation; who really knows what goes on in their minds. Someone, either an individual or groups, was bound to exploit the situation. Something was bound to blow up.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Jordan Richardson
But most of the Utoya victims would be alive today if anyone had had a gun
More "action movie" mentality, huh?
What do you figure would have happened? 12-13 year old kids would have been diving through the trees on the island, trading fire with the gunman in John Woo slo-mo?
It's also not true to say that police in Norway are "totally unarmed."
2 - RJ
I was unaware, Jordan, that teenage boys are inherently incapable of figuring out how to aim and pull a trigger.
It seems that it wasn't so long ago that it was pretty standard practice for fathers to teach their teenage sons how to shoot a gun, at least in rural areas.
But you're probably right. The idea that a courageous, well-trained, and armed teenager could have stopped the slaughter is just Hollywood crazy-talk. Better to wait 90 minutes for the police to arrive while dozens of children are slaughtered by the only person with a gun.
3 - Jordan Richardson
It's a simplistic retort that is sounded time and time again, RJ. If only ____ had a gun, ____ wouldn't have happened.
You're talking about a panic situation and employing a pretty idealistic point of view, whereas I take a more pessimistic view of the issue in general. I don't think more guns make us a safer society and I don't know that the situation would have necessarily been reversed or prevented had a teenager been "well-trained" and armed.
The inference is that a "progressive" and permissive worldview makes us more vulnerable. We should be afraid and arm ourselves because people are out to get us.
4 - RJ
"I don't think more guns make us a safer society"
5 - Dr Dreadful
You know, there can be few places on Earth containing more guns than an army base. Someone trying to carry out a mass shooting at one of those places wouldn't get very far. Nope. No siree.
6 - Irene Athena
It is my understanding that no one, even with a conceal and carry permit, is allowed to possess a gun on Fort Hood Army Base. People who own guns have to have them checked in at the armory for the duration of their stay at the base, as it is a "gun free zone."
7 - Irene Athena
This is the case at most, if not all army bases. Anyone else know for sure?
8 - RJ
Dread:
From your link:
Lt. General Cone stated: "As a matter of practice, we do not carry weapons on Fort Hood. This is our home." Military weapons are only used for training or by base security, and personal weapons must be kept locked away by the provost marshal. Specialist Jerry Richard, a soldier working at the Readiness Center, expressed the opinion that this policy had left them unnecessarily vulnerable to violent assaults: "Overseas you are ready for it. But here you can't even defend yourself."
But nice try!
9 - Dr Dreadful
I stand corrected.
I note, however, that the base police officers who responded to the shooting were armed, but that they still needed several minutes to subdue Hasan - and he took one of them down anyway before she could stop him.
Being armed isn't some kind of (excuse me) magic bullet: there's no guarantee that the shooter won't get you before you get him.
10 - Jordan Richardson
Am I supposed to read that book, RJ? Or is the title alone supposed to prove your point?
11 - Dr Dreadful
America has the right to bear arms enshrined in its constitution, has more gun crime than the rest of the galaxy put together, yet we're somehow supposed to believe that the more guns there are, the safer we are. I still can't grasp the mentality behind that one.
12 - Jordan Richardson
It's because not enough people are armed. Only when there's a gun in every preschooler's lunchpail will we truly be safe.
13 - Irene Athena
Oh Dr. Dreadful and Jordan Richardson, you're just being silly now.
14 - handyguy
I can't grasp it either, Doc, but I have learned through experience how futile it is to try to argue the point with True Believers. Much heat and little light is generated in the very long discussions that follow.
15 - Irene Athena
See I don't get it. Dr. Dreadful can (not deliberately, I'm sure) post a bit of misinformation about the Way Things Are on Army Bases, be called out on it, and then continue to steamroll "the opposition" without so much as a "woopsy daisy."
16 - Jordan Richardson
What are you talking about? He said "I stand corrected" in #9 and made another point.
17 - RJ
I know leftists have difficulty grasping the concept, so thankfully I'm here to help!
Guns and Crime in Chicago
Murder rates soared in D.C. and Chicago after their gun bans were put in place. As shown in the just released third edition of my book More Guns, Less Crime, before the late-1982 ban, Chicago’s murder rate was falling relative to those in the nine other largest cities, the 50 largest cities, the five counties that border Cook County (in which the city is located), and the U.S. as a whole. After the ban, Chicago’s murder rate rose relative to all these other places. Compared with the 50 most populous cities, Chicago’s murder rate went from equaling the average for the other cities in 1982, to exceeding their average murder rate by 32 percent in 1992, to exceeding their average by 68 percent in 2002.
18 - Irene Athena
But I would've had to scroll my page up to see that, Jordan Richardson. Sorry, Dr. Dreadful.
19 - RJ
From the BBC:
A new study suggests the use of handguns in crime rose by 40% in the two years after the weapons were banned. The research, commissioned by the Countryside Alliance's Campaign for Shooting, has concluded that existing laws are targeting legitimate users of firearms rather than criminals.
But that's just crazy-talk. Everyone knows the BBC is a right-wing propaganda outlet full of hate and lies.
20 - RJ
Gun crime goes up by 89% in a decade
B-b-but...guns were banned! And the ban made them magically disappear!
Gun crime has almost doubled since Labour came to power as a culture of extreme gang violence has taken hold. The latest Government figures show that the total number of firearm offences in England and Wales has increased from 5,209 in 1998/99 to 9,865 last year - a rise of 89 per cent.
21 - Irene Athena
Jordan Richardson, one of my concerns about negating second amendment rights is that it makes a population vulnerable to a government that has has an increasingly militaristic stance, not only toward its neighbors in the world, but toward its own citizens.
But we've been in a loooooooooooong conversation recently about police over-reach, Jordan Richardson, and yes, I'm with you: it's too soon to have another one like it. Good night, now.
22 - Jordan Richardson
I'm not advocating a gun ban. I never have. Let's just get that right out in the open, shall we?
23 - Dr Dreadful
RJ, you are misconstruing the thing that I have difficulty grasping.
I cannot help but notice that the cities of Chicago and Washington DC are located within the country called the United States of America, which as I noted before has a constitutionally protected right to gun ownership. This means that there are a lot of guns about, because by definition there is a potential market for them of 300 million and counting.
There are also effective gun bans in major world cities such as London, Berlin, Tokyo and Paris. The homicide rate in these cities - and in particular the gun homicide rate - is nowhere near the rate in any sizeable American city.
Now how is that the defenceless citizens of these metropoli aren't thoroughly riddled with bullet holes, whereas the defenseless citizens of the Windy City and the Other Windy City are?
24 - Jordan Richardson
Irene, I've never advocated "negating second amendment rights" here or elsewhere. My stance is merely one that questions the idea that guns make us inherently safer.
25 - Irene Athena
And I've never advocated putting a gun in every preschooler's lunchpail.