<p>"Violent images in movies and video games " are not proven to have effect whatsoever. It is funny, how we are claiming that he was brilliant and in next second point out to stupid things like this. So, was he brilliant or was he stupid to play out violence in movies?</p>
<p>Several serial killers have been highly intelligent–Ted K, Ted Bundy etc and some have not. All are deeply disturbed.
One good thing I saw was that several men did the bravest thing possible–they died protecting their girlfriends, etc. Men have been getting bashed pretty often and loudly for decades. But not all of them are scumbags. Some are real heroes.</p>
<p><a href=“National News - New York Daily News”>National News - New York Daily News;
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<p>You can also find videos of terrorists blowing themselves up by accident.</p>
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<p>The FBI has caught many people trying to do the mass-murderer thing over the years. Do you think that they were dumb or smart?</p>
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<p>Some good investigative work, some good luck.</p>
<p>Why is his intelligence relevant? His destructive will seems to be the point, given that he was clearly intelligent enough for forming relatively complex plans.</p>
<p>There are studies that show that people exposed to violent images are more likely to be violent themselves. </p>
<p>If media had no impact, then why not show smoking on TV? If it had no impact it wouldn’t influence people to smoke or not smoke? Why advertise anything if it wouldn’t influence behavior? Why the calls for fashion magazines to stop showing anorexic models? Obviously, media does influence people. </p>
<p>We have to ask ourselves whether violence is really ‘entertainment’.</p>
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<p>Someone complained about the access to guns issue - someone else said that he would have figured out another way to kill people if he didn’t have access to guns. His intelligence and the IEDs that he made point to an ability to kill people without firearms.</p>
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<p>No one doubts media’s capacity to influence people in some ways. Specific cases are needed to establish that sphere of influence. It’s less clear that violent imagery is criminogenic than it is that showing excessively skinny models promotes body dysmorphia.</p>
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<p>I would say that the greater difficulty required to carry out a destructive attack without firearms would reduce the likelihood that he would have pursued those more difficult routes if he lacked access to guns, even if his intelligence offered him that capability. In any case, madness is peculiar, and it is not necessarily presumable that he was laser-focused on maximum destruction by whatever means attainable; particular fixation on using guns is conceivable.</p>
<p>The stronger arguments for gun limitation, in my opinion, come not from mass shootings (because psychosis makes rationally oriented analysis less convincing) but instead from all the accidental shootings that occur in attempted self-defense, in which no alternative criminality would be sought in the absence of gun access.</p>
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<p>But he did pursue those routes in his apartment.</p>
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<p>The apartment of the suspect in the Colorado theater rampage was decorated with Batman items and crisscrossed with waist-high trip wires attached to more than 30 improvised grenades strewn across the living room floor, a law enforcement official close to the case said Sunday. Nearby were 10 gallons of gasoline “to enhance the thermal effect.”</p>
<p>[Trip</a> wires, Batman items found in theater shooting suspect’s home - latimes.com](<a href=“http://www.latimes.com/news/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-holmes-apartment-explosives-20120722,0,5256563.story]Trip”>Trip wires, Batman items found in theater shooting suspect's home)</p>
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<p>That’s kind of wandering off the thread and should probably make for a standalone thread. But it would get littered with political stuff and killed.</p>
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<p>He did figure out another way to kill people. His apartment was apparently filled by many bombs or hand grenades and other lethal boobie traps that he made himself. </p>
<p>The fact is, however, that despite being able to make bombs, he chose to kill people by gun. It’s a more personal way to murder. Knives are more personal still, but harder to kill a high number of people that way.</p>
<p>I had a cousin who was psychotic. If anyone thinks he would have been deterred by threat or punishment has never spoken to a psychotic. We had a campfire once, and we had to pull his feet away from the fire because his skin started charring, and he wasn’t even aware of it. You could talk to him, and sometimes he would answer; but his answers were not necessarily connected to the point - there was no true communication. He simply was in another world, not ours. He was better when he took his medication, but it’s a tough cycle: if he took his meds, he felt that he was well enough to not need them anymore. One day he built a cross, put himself on it a couple of hours, then walked to a bridge and threw himself off.</p>
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<p>The research seems to show no causal connection between exposure to porn (movies or print or written) and committing sex crimes, but that wasn’t politically acceptable.</p>
<p>[President’s</a> Commission on Obscenity and Pornography - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President’s_Commission_on_Obscenity_and_Pornography]President’s”>President's Commission on Obscenity and Pornography - Wikipedia)</p>
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<p>I was speaking in terms of probability rather than manifestation. Anyhow, the explosive arrangement in the apartment was decidedly differently employed than were the guns. Defensive setup of bombs in the apartment (which he notified police of prior to their attempted entry) does not demonstrate willingness or desire to offensively attack with them.</p>
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<p>Yep.</p>
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<p>I think that the example of your cousin isn’t applicable to all psychotics.</p>
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<p>The point of this thread is that if you removed access to guns - he would have found another way to pull this off. Which would kill more people, guns or grenades?</p>
<p>“The point of this thread is that if you removed access to guns - he would have found another way to pull this off. Which would kill more people, guns or grenades?”</p>
<p>If and when he finds another way, then we can know for sure which would kill more. Did he want to kill more and why did he choose this way? Would he even kill at all if there is not this way?</p>
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<p>First, it’s unknown whether he would have even initiated a destructive plan if his access to guns had been restricted. Second, it’s unknown whether he would have attempted to offensively use explosives if a destructive plan were still undertaken. Third, it’s unknown whether he would have been able to effectively deploy explosives in an offensive attack from a logistical perspective. Fourth, it’s unknown whether law enforcement would have stopped his explosives attack. Finally, the fatal eventuality of those offensive explosives is unknown.</p>
<p>Given the actual ultimate fatality of his use of guns, immediate assumption that it is fortunate that guns were around to distract him from using explosives to kill people overlooks many uncertainties.</p>
<p>I just can’t get over the argument; since there are many other ways to kill, let’s not worry about the one that is being used and easily accessible for the killing.</p>
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<p>The simple point that I made is that there were other means at his disposal to kill people.</p>
<p>I don’t understand why so many argue against this.</p>
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<p>I don’t think anyone has disagreed with that statement. Our opposition is to the relevance of that technically true potentiality.</p>