OT: Highland Park 4th of July Parade Mass Shooting

[Axolotl]

What a terrible, terrible thing. Again.

[RSP83]

I feel bad for what's happening in the US. Sorry, I don't mean to call out just 1 country, obviously violence exist in every country. But this random mass shooting I think is relatively unique to the US. I hope you guys figure it out soon. It's a recurring issue, and I'm surprised US with its long and rich civil rights movement background haven't been able to make much progress to solve it for quiet sometime now.

[Michael Jackson]

Since meaningful gun control is a non-starter in this country, they should at least be pouring more resources into figuring out what is going with young males in this country that makes them so angry and deranged that they act out in this way. It seems like 90% of these shooters are men under the age of 25. Something is going on in that demographic that is making this a commonplace form of rebellion. Maybe they need more outlets for their aggression, maybe schools/parents/society needs to do a better job with kids that are lonely, picked on, or isolated. So many of these criminals fit the same stereotype- loners with few social contacts. It should be a wake up sign- really should have been ever since Columbine, but it just seems to be getting worse.

As a society, we now idolize fame and attention. That's something new that's developed in recent decades and has really exploded with social media. It's a sickening of the spirit and leaves too many left out youth thinking that what they really need is to make a huge splash to became famous and notorious and finally get a piece of the pie. No value for human life.

The social media “fame” aspect of this is an ever increasing problem. The major outlets for the “fame” aspect be it twitter, Tik Tok etc… but really the 4Chan’s of the world (and I know 4 Chan is just a shell and these sites constantly move and evolve). It’s the grossest thing because there is just so much access to these “cults”. These people prey upon a certain type and get them fired up and we get this with much more frequency.

I was taking the family to our local 4th party (which we had not been too because Covid cancelled it when we moved last year) and it is a legendary one. I get the message about this literally as we are leaving, and I almost didn’t go but we did anyway as we are a little more small towny feel. The Highland Park thing shocked me immediately but then when I gave it some thought, it made sense. A place that is shocking is the type of place that will be targeted by these people who want the fame. The absolute senseless of the shooting is bonkers to me but I appreciate that it is not supposed to be logical to anyone. Obviously the loss of life is the most tragic thing but point 1b is there are others of this “group” that watched that yesterday and it inspired them to go further down their own personal rabbit hole. My heart is broken and I think any sane persons would be.

[JimmyButler21]

I feel bad for what's happening in the US. Sorry, I don't mean to call out just 1 country, obviously violence exist in every country. But this random mass shooting I think is relatively unique to the US. I hope you guys figure it out soon. It's a recurring issue, and I'm surprised US with its long and rich civil rights movement background haven't been able to make much progress to solve it for quiet sometime now.

Politics are treated like a daily sporting event in America where each side has to pick their "team". Creating gun restriction laws that might stop even one mass shooting would be seem like a "loss" for one side. Combined with the fact that the NRA lines the GOP's pockets with money to make sure lax gun laws stay in tact.

[League Circles]

Since meaningful gun control is a non-starter in this country, they should at least be pouring more resources into figuring out what is going with young males in this country that makes them so angry and deranged that they act out in this way. It seems like 90% of these shooters are men under the age of 25. Something is going on in that demographic that is making this a commonplace form of rebellion. Maybe they need more outlets for their aggression, maybe schools/parents/society needs to do a better job with kids that are lonely, picked on, or isolated. So many of these criminals fit the same stereotype- loners with few social contacts. It should be a wake up sign- really should have been ever since Columbine, but it just seems to be getting worse.

As a society, we now idolize fame and attention. That's something new that's developed in recent decades and has really exploded with social media. It's a sickening of the spirit and leaves too many left out youth thinking that what they really need is to make a huge splash to became famous and notorious and finally get a piece of the pie. No value for human life.

The social media “fame” aspect of this is an ever increasing problem. The major outlets for the “fame” aspect be it twitter, Tik Tok etc… but really the 4Chan’s of the world (and I know 4 Chan is just a shell and these sites constantly move and evolve). It’s the grossest thing because there is just so much access to these “cults”. These people prey upon a certain type and get them fired up and we get this with much more frequency.

I was taking the family to our local 4th party (which we had not been too because Covid cancelled it when we moved last year) and it is a legendary one. I get the message about this literally as we are leaving, and I almost didn’t go but we did anyway as we are a little more small towny feel. The Highland Park thing shocked me immediately but then when I gave it some thought, it made sense. A place that is shocking is the type of place that will be targeted by these people who want the fame. The absolute senseless of the shooting is bonkers to me but I appreciate that it is not supposed to be logical to anyone. Obviously the loss of life is the most tragic thing but point 1b is there are others of this “group” that watched that yesterday and it inspired them to go further down their own personal rabbit hole. My heart is broken and I think any sane persons would be.

Yeah, I'm not familiar with what 4chan is, but I stopped using social media in 2012 because I saw that it causes mental illness among so many people. For most it's just anxiety or other issues, but for some like this alleged killer, it can be much more. I'll never let my child on any of these mind killing platforms. They short circuit our entire evolved communication biology in what is IMO an obvious way. Sort of analogous to how drugs shirt circuit the pleasure circuits in our brains. Pretty predictable that rapid drastic changes in fundamental biological mechanisms such as human to human communication would be substantial risks to act as a plague on our entire civilization.

Fwiw, this suspect is local. He lives in my neighborhood. I'm not afraid of ANYBODY and this monster creeped me out big time when I'd see him walking around the neighborhood as my memory is jogged today. Just that blank killer look and demeanor, which is strongly seen in his insane youtube videos and their over the top foreshadowed imagery. This guy basically told the world what he was gonna do and nobody listened. His uncle who lives with him said there were no signs............. How about looking at his **** face and behavior for the obvious signs???? Smfh.

[AshyLarrysDiaper]

Take the guns. This is madness. You find isolated and disturbed young men everywhere. It’s only here that you can expect this stuff to happen several times a month.

[League Circles]

I'm very open to additional gun control laws, but I'm cautioned against adopting whatever "do something" measure that the left wants to adopt because I don't think most of them will have much of an impact, and don't want the constant conflict and reactionary dialogue every time it happens. Again, I stress, I'm very open to stricter gun control, but as a society we need to understand that while additional smart gun control could decrease the frequency and severity of these horrific events, they are not fundamentally problems of gun access or capabilities. It is primarily a spiritual/moral problem.
IMO, too many people want to "do something" (trivial), and will then just want to "do something more" to infinity while the problem only gets incrementally improved. It's trivial to kill a bunch of people if that's what you want to do, regardless of gun laws. We should more strictly regulate firearm access FOR SURE, but then KNOW that that will only make marginal improvements. Then roll up our sleeves and start talking about love and life again more than fame and fortune.

[League Circles]

Take the guns. This is madness. You find isolated and disturbed young men everywhere. It’s only here that you can expect this stuff to happen several times a month.

Are you willing to put tons of people in jail for life for non-compliance?

I might be, but that's the likely required tradeoff to actually make a huge decrease in the number of firearms already on the streets.

It's kinda like drugs. The middle ground is futile. You either need to legalize them all, or have SEVERE punishments for people doing it for economic reasons (dealers). I'm talking Saudi level policies here. Not saying I necessarily want that at all, but that's what it would take to seriously curb our drug problem IMO.

The analogy for guns IMO is this:

1. The 400 million guns on the street or whatever it is could perform a million mass killings for 200 years going forward even if another gun was never sold in this country. So....

2. You have to get most of those guns off the street to seriously curbmass shootings. There will be incredible opposition to this for political/social reasons, but let's set that aside for the moment, because ostensibly, people who actually deeply care about gun rights for philosophical reasons are probably mostly not the direct problem regarding mass shootings. The key is to make it so that mass shooter X (who verifiably proclaims that he doesn't care about anything or anyone) cannot EVEN ILLEGALLY get a gun from illegal arms dealer Y. IMO, the only way to really do that is for illegal arms dealer Y to know for sure that if he gets caught, he's going to prison for life.

Are we willing to do that? I'm on the fence, but I do believe that's what it would take.

[League Circles]

Take the guns. This is madness. You find isolated and disturbed young men everywhere. It’s only here that you can expect this stuff to happen several times a month.

How could we measure the extent of our social illness though? How do we actually know that there are comparable %s of isolated and disturbed young men everywhere ? Countries and cultures are all different. I definitely do not presume that we are equally healthy from a social/moral standpoint with other societies. We may well have way more disturbed young men than other places.

[HearshotKDS]

Next door in Lake Forest, we visted the Lake Bluff parade (we are half way inbetween Lake Bluff and Highland park - could have gone to either one) but its very spooky to think we could have just as easily been at the HP parade. People in the area are stunned that something like this could happen here, not supposed to see the place my wife gets her nails done behind police tape, chalk outlines, and bloodstains on the news.

[AshyLarrysDiaper]

Take the guns. This is madness. You find isolated and disturbed young men everywhere. It’s only here that you can expect this stuff to happen several times a month.

Are you willing to put tons of people in jail for life for non-compliance?

I might be, but that's the likely required tradeoff to actually make a huge decrease in the number of firearms already on the streets.

It's kinda like drugs. The middle ground is futile. You either need to legalize them all, or have SEVERE punishments for people doing it for economic reasons (dealers). I'm talking Saudi level policies here. Not saying I necessarily want that at all, but that's what it would take to seriously curb our drug problem IMO.

The analogy for guns IMO is this:

1. The 400 million guns on the street or whatever it is could perform a million mass killings for 200 years going forward even if another gun was never sold in this country. So....

2. You have to get most of those guns off the street to seriously curbmass shootings. There will be incredible opposition to this for political/social reasons, but let's set that aside for the moment, because ostensibly, people who actually deeply care about gun rights for philosophical reasons are probably mostly not the direct problem regarding mass shootings. The key is to make it so that mass shooter X (who verifiably proclaims that he doesn't care about anything or anyone) cannot EVEN ILLEGALLY get a gun from illegal arms dealer Y. IMO, the only way to really do that is for illegal arms dealer Y to know for sure that if he gets caught, he's going to prison for life.

Are we willing to do that? I'm on the fence, but I do believe that's what it would take.

Yes, I’m willing to put people in prison for guns.

No, I don’t think it’s like drugs at all. There hasn’t been a successful drug ban in the western world, to my knowledge, which is why most countries have switched their focus from enforcement to treatment.

Weapons of mass death, on the other hand, are successfully banned in many, many countries.

[League Circles]

Yes, I’m willing to put people in prison for guns.

No, I don’t think it’s like drugs at all. There hasn’t been a successful drug ban in the western world, to my knowledge, which is why most countries have switched their focus from enforcement to treatment.

Weapons of mass death, on the other hand, are successfully banned in many, many countries.

Put them in prison, or put them in prison for life?

What's the significance of the "western world"? There are plenty of countries in the arbitrarily defined other half of the world without drug problems.

What is a "weapon of mass death" as opposed to a weapon of moderate death? Virtually any firearm can trivially be used to kill many people randomly.

And did any of the countries that have successfully banned them have more guns than people (not to mention constitutional protection) at the time of the ban?

This is an American problem that requires a specifically American solution. You could ban every firearm in the country tomorrow and if the penalties aren't strong enough, gun use won't be decreased.

[AshyLarrysDiaper]

Take the guns. This is madness. You find isolated and disturbed young men everywhere. It’s only here that you can expect this stuff to happen several times a month.

How could we measure the extent of our social illness though? How do we actually know that there are comparable %s of isolated and disturbed young men everywhere ? Countries and cultures are all different. I definitely do not presume that we are equally healthy from a social/moral standpoint with other societies. We may well have way more disturbed young men than other places.

Social illness is measured all the time. It’s a developing field and the tools are imperfect, but even if you take for granted that the US is on the bad end of the spectrum mental health-wise, that doesn’t explain why we account for more mass shooting deaths then the rest of the western world combined.

[League Circles]

Take the guns. This is madness. You find isolated and disturbed young men everywhere. It’s only here that you can expect this stuff to happen several times a month.

How could we measure the extent of our social illness though? How do we actually know that there are comparable %s of isolated and disturbed young men everywhere ? Countries and cultures are all different. I definitely do not presume that we are equally healthy from a social/moral standpoint with other societies. We may well have way more disturbed young men than other places.

Social illness is measured all the time. It’s a developing field and the tools are imperfect, but even if you take for granted that the US is on the bad end of the spectrum mental health-wise, that doesn’t explain why we account for more mass shooting deaths then the rest of the western world combined.

I'd be interested to see some of these measures. It's such an intangible concept that I find it hard to grasp how it would be measured. I'm not talking about mental illness though, to be clear. I'm moreso talking about values.

[AshyLarrysDiaper]

Yes, I’m willing to put people in prison for guns.

No, I don’t think it’s like drugs at all. There hasn’t been a successful drug ban in the western world, to my knowledge, which is why most countries have switched their focus from enforcement to treatment.

Weapons of mass death, on the other hand, are successfully banned in many, many countries.

Put them in prison, or put them in prison for life?

What's the significance of the "western world"? There are plenty of countries in the arbitrarily defined other half of the world without drug problems.

What is a "weapon of mass death" as opposed to a weapon of moderate death? Virtually any firearm can trivially be used to kill many people randomly.

And did any of the countries that have successfully banned them have more guns than people (not to mention constitutional protection) at the time of the ban?

This is an American problem that requires a specifically American solution. You could ban every firearm in the country tomorrow and if the penalties aren't strong enough, gun use won't be decreased.

I reference western countries because nearly all are on the spectrum of republic to direct democracy. Draconian laws and enforcement aren’t an option to the degree they are in, say, China or Saudi Arabia (though I think there are select examples of the US falling down in this respect).

I’m not interested in parsing prison sentences. That’s not the discussion. Weapons of ‘mass death’ versus ‘moderate death’ is also something for the technocrats to work out. What’s very clear is that AR-15-style rifles have no place in civilian hands. If we can’t agree on that much, there isn’t much else to discuss.

[ATRAIN53]

glad you other locals are safe-

Was at the fireworks on Saturday night in Deerfield. Before it started I was watching everyone smiling and having fun and then had this weird feeling like what would happen if someone opened fire on this massive crowd? My kid felt it too but didn't want to say something and freak us out.

I was just literally right where this happened last week on Friday night for Taste of Highland Park. We were in Highwood this Friday to see a band. Like were just getting out and back to normal seeing music with friends and crowds.

I have tix for the Black Crowes at Ravinia next week but I can't fathom hanging at Ravinia right now.....

[dougthonus]

Yes, I’m willing to put people in prison for guns.

No, I don’t think it’s like drugs at all. There hasn’t been a successful drug ban in the western world, to my knowledge, which is why most countries have switched their focus from enforcement to treatment.

Weapons of mass death, on the other hand, are successfully banned in many, many countries.

I think this is a good point, but I don't think it fairly accounts for the context of the history of this country and cultural value around guns that runs really, really deep in many areas. I think it'd be very hard to do so successfully here and actually get the guns off the streets.

I think the cost to actually solve shooting problems is so much higher than the benefit you would gain in solving it. You literally might need to spend a trillion dollars to solve this problem. I'd rather dump a trillion dollars into social safety nets then imprisoning people who keep guns or paying for the program to get rid of 100s of millions of guns.

Coming off of the COVID crisis and massive debt we have added, when we have to make really hard choices about our finances as a country and getting the most out of our dollars, how much money would you dump into preventing mass shooting deaths? Top google search said we have 277 mass shooting deaths since 2000.

The deaths around suicide may not go down with reduction of guns and violent crime deaths will be tougher to stop because they already hinge on illegal guns, but both of these areas can probably also largely be impacted positively via social change vs changes in gun laws.

I'm not attached to keeping guns in this country at all, and if I could wave my magic wand and remove all the guns and make us a gun free area, I would do so, but the cost to get from here to there vs our other problems and the benefits gained from solving this problem or other problems are exactly the things you have to consider. Would I rather put 1 trillion dollars into getting guns off the streets or social reform for minorities? That's a real choice you might need to take. As you well know, we don't have infinite money.

It isn't a direct either or, we can iteratively get better about guns without solving the whole problem, and I don't set our budget so don't know what you could go about doing reasonably. I would love to have reform to iteratively move in the right direction though.

[League Circles]

Yes, I’m willing to put people in prison for guns.

No, I don’t think it’s like drugs at all. There hasn’t been a successful drug ban in the western world, to my knowledge, which is why most countries have switched their focus from enforcement to treatment.

Weapons of mass death, on the other hand, are successfully banned in many, many countries.

Put them in prison, or put them in prison for life?

What's the significance of the "western world"? There are plenty of countries in the arbitrarily defined other half of the world without drug problems.

What is a "weapon of mass death" as opposed to a weapon of moderate death? Virtually any firearm can trivially be used to kill many people randomly.

And did any of the countries that have successfully banned them have more guns than people (not to mention constitutional protection) at the time of the ban?

This is an American problem that requires a specifically American solution. You could ban every firearm in the country tomorrow and if the penalties aren't strong enough, gun use won't be decreased.

I reference western countries because nearly all are on the spectrum of republic to direct democracy. Draconian laws and enforcement aren’t an option to the degree they are in, say, China or Saudi Arabia (though I think there are select examples of the US falling down in this respect).

I’m not interested in parsing prison sentences. That’s not the discussion. Weapons of ‘mass death’ versus ‘moderate death’ is also something for the technocrats to work out. What’s very clear is that AR-15-style rifles have no place in civilian hands. If we can’t agree on that much, there isn’t much else to discuss.

I don't see what's inherently draconian about punishing someone for 50 years for something that is already punished for, say, 10 years (drug or gun violations). It sounds like you are saying that what would actually be effective is too harsh for you to stomach. Which I totally respect. But should be identified if that is in fact the case. Because they're can truly be a massive massive difference in incentives between prison sentences like that. A lot of people would risk doing something if the punishment was 10 years in prison that would not risk doing the same thing if the punishment was life in prison. For me legal punishments are primarily for the purpose of deterrence, not punishment.

The problem is that "AR-15 style rifles" is an incredibly vague and arbitrary description, usually offered by mass media for clicks and people who know nothing about guns. That's why people ask questions like I do such as what exact attributes of an AR-15 style rifle are the attributes that we are trying to regulate against? It's an honest question. It could be bullet capacity or it could be modularity or it could just be sensationalism. Sadly, it's trivial to kill a lot of people if that's what you want to do, whether it's with an "AR-15", a (more powerful than an AR-15) hunting rifle, a common handgun, or driving a van through a crowd of people on the sidewalk.

I really want to stress that I am not throwing my hands up and saying oh there's nothing that can be done we just have to accept this. I'm just saying that the devil is in the details and we need to be very specific about what we are trying to do, about what our expectations are, and about what trade-offs we are willing to accept. I don't see a lot of that in the public discourse on the issue of gun control and violence.

[Mirotek]

I feel bad for what's happening in the US. Sorry, I don't mean to call out just 1 country, obviously violence exist in every country. But this random mass shooting I think is relatively unique to the US. I hope you guys figure it out soon. It's a recurring issue, and I'm surprised US with its long and rich civil rights movement background haven't been able to make much progress to solve it for quiet sometime now.

Just take a look at Twitter comments when it involves a mass shooting and you'll see how messed up America is. Instead of everyone working together to find a solution, it's always pointing fingers. Even with the shooting yesterday, people are like "See! He's MAGA!", "No! He's Antifa! Here's proof!" We're focused on the wrong things and like people have said earlier, America is so divided now to the point of no saving, sadly.

[1985Bear]

If the gun laws in Illinois were passed Federally, it is about as much regulation as we could want. Then comes down to enforcement of those laws.

When I discuss this with my Gun loving friends , they always say Illinois has toughest laws but Chicago still has murders so don’t do anything is their answer. The issue is that 20-30% of guns used in Illinois crime come from neighboring Wisconsin and Indiana with very soft gun regulation. It’s why it has to be federal.

Another sticking point for gun owners is registration of every gun. It is a non starter for them “if the Government knows what guns I have, that is first step to taking them” It’s ridiculous, there has to be a well funded aggressive ATF with a database of who owns what. My counter has always been, if you are a good guy with gun, why would you care about them being registered.

If a husband has 30 guns, beats his wife and gets convicted of a felony with jail time, He will be put on the can’t buy a gun list anymore. But no one goes to his house and gets the other 30 guns because there is no database of what he has to match it against. Almost all women who are murdered are by domestic abusers. The most common trait of mass shooters is a domestic violence history. For me, a database of registered guns and enforcement of current laws is a big first step. Convicted violent criminals should have their guns taken away and lose that right to bear arms in the future. ATF database would allow for that. A national registry would also monitor “straw purchasers” and the movement of guns. I am sure police would love to know when they show up to a house, how many guns are there before they knock on the door.

Mental health is part of the equation and everyone is on board with finding ways to help them, but only half the debate wants them to not buy guns. Trumps first act as president was to UNDO a law preventing mental health sufferers from buying guns.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/trump-signs-bill-revoking-obama-era-gun-checks-people-mental-n727221


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