campus massacre--virginia tech

[yvonne johnson]

These lucky souls barricaded themselves in the classroom. [Couldn't do that at my place as the classroom doors open outwards into the corridor.]

 

"Three other students moved a table that was in front of the room and barricaded it against the door.

 

A few seconds later, the shooter tried to open the door, but my classmates kept it well shut, as they held the table against it.

 

The shooter shot the door twice at chest level, which resulted in two holes in the door, one of which hit the podium in the front of the classroom and the other continued out the window.

 

At this point he reloaded, shot the door again - this shot did not penetrate - and moved on to the other classrooms."

[foodie52]

horrible

[Kim]

not sure why I was asked to edit this post, and not my previous, but as per admins request, I am deleting this post.

[lovelynugget]

[Edited per mods] I think Liza was referring to the statements made through his press secretary: Article

 

 

[snip. snip. snip.]

[rancho_gordo]

[Edited at the request of the admins.}

[foodie52]

I think the main thing here is to think about the families who tried to call their children on their cell phones and got their voice mail.

 

All else is crap.

 

Keep these poor families in your thoughts and prayers, please.

[Behemoth]

They interviewed a custodial worker on NPR who identified the shooter as "foreign". I've seen reports that the guy is possibly of Asian descent. This scares the hell out of me. Let's say he turns out to be an American of Indonesian descent, for example. People debate gun rights when it's a random white crazy person but if it turns out to be a random crazy "other" person the debate will be about something very different and will put the rights and safety of a lot of innocent people in danger. I hope the masses are smarter than that but the few times I've caught Fox news recently make me very pessimistic.

[GG Mora]

The Admins have asked a number of posters to self-edit; some have been cooperative (thank you), some not. We're loathe to do the editing ourselves, but it leaves us looking wildly inconsistent. We'd simply ask – again – that the subject of gun control not become the subject of this thread. So far everyone's been civil (thank you again), but political discussion is a violation of Guideline 4, and gun control is nothing if not political.

 

We didn't write the rules – we've just been charged with the impossible job of interpreting and enforcing them.

 

The Admin Team

[mongo_jones]

just don't ask me to change the word i used to link to the story.

[ghostrider]

Media vultures intoning "Day of death," "Death came to the campus," "Death stalked the halls," etc. Even in this hour of horrible grief they have to see who can out-hype the last guy. Disgusting.

 

"Years from now, we'll remember exactly where we were when we heard the news." Sorry mate, we won't. This ain't JFK or 9/11. Does anybody remember exactly where they were when they heard about Columbine? Seriously?

 

All so pointless. They got to the campus so fast with their mobile crews & they have absolutely nothing to say. They don't even have enough footage to fill out a report, they keep showing the same pudgy cop running with a machine gun over & over again. Why bother?

[Miguel Gierbolini]

They interviewed a custodial worker on NPR who identified the shooter as "foreign". I've seen reports that the guy is possibly of Asian descent. This scares the hell out of me. Let's say he turns out to be an American of Indonesian descent, for example. People debate gun rights when it's a random white crazy person but if it turns out to be a random crazy "other" person the debate will be about something very different and will put the rights and safety of a lot of innocent people in danger. I hope the masses are smarter than that but the few times I've caught Fox news recently make me very pessimistic.

 

 

It is an "Asian" male according to the latest reports this morning. Not really helpful. Anything between Turkey, Jordan and Israel all the way through Pakistan, India, China to Japan is Asia.

[Miguel Gierbolini]

Just to clarify, a little piece of Turkey, that part West of the Bosphorus (which divides Istanbul), is in Europe.

[Lippy]

It is an "Asian" male according to the latest reports this morning. Not really helpful. Anything between Turkey, Jordan and Israel all the way through Pakistan, India, China to Japan is Asia.

 

They are making what they think is a racial, not a geographical, characterization. Usually serial killers and rampage shooters are "white males." The fact (if it turns out to be true) that this shooter is not is news, as much the high number of victims.

[ghostrider]

Half an hour ago they reported that he was a Chinese national. 10 minutes ago they changed that to Korean national.

[Lippy]

He was a senior English major who lived on campus, according to the NYTimes.