I’m local, this guy terrorized the Austin area, there is no sympathy for him around here.
@sciencenerd, what are you basing this statement on?
I’m local, too - one bomb went off in my neighborhood. I have a lot of sympathy for his parents and family, as I do for the victims of the horrible things that he did. I believe I have had experience with a child psychopath; taught him in my class and will never forget him. He was attractive, intelligent, extremely manipulative, and showed no remorse for any of his actions that hurt others, and he did deliberately hurt others if they interfered with what he wanted. He matter-fact explained to me that he could kill people, then shrugged when I explained the consequences of his actions. I did my best to form connections with him, but he was just empty in that department. Extremely scary. I feel that one day, I may read about him in the paper. I hope not.
@Nrdsb4 -Mainly on how the media is portraying him as and how people will be shaped by those same ideas.
“came from a good family” etc.
No talks yet on improving intelligence gathering or law enforcement or bans on people or products.
I don’t think @sciencenerd necessarily meant on this thread. I know my comment was about the coverage in general. It’s always like this when the perp is white, middle class kid.
The police said he was “a very challenged young man.”
Funny, the Tsarnaevs weren’t deemed “challenged young men.” They were called terrorists.
They were not commonly described as Caucasian either.
I don’t have any problem with the description of him as “challenged”. I think in this case it meant “really screwed up” and was not meant at all to be soft o the guy.
For me, hearing my relatives describe the guy, it’s just shock I feel. My uncle said he never would have expected something like this. The young man seemed really nice. I DO feel sorry for his parents, since our son has a serious mental illness that we never expected him to get.
The roommate that I know has gotten deluged with calls and texts from networks and big newspapers, but he’s ignoring all of them because he doesn’t want to be interviewed. My uncle was able to take him to the house today to collect his things and will help him find a new place to live now.
My prayers go out to those affected and may all stay safe.
Because they gave a specific reason for their bombing and murder spree: extremist Islamic beliefs and revenge for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Apparently, Conditt never said why he was doing the bombings. I’d definitely call him a terrorist even though, without a motive other than to kill people because my life sucks, it might not meet the legal definition. I guess he would fall under the serial killer category (of course, serial killers “terrorize” a city through repeated random attacks but apparently it requires a political/religious motive to be deemed “terrorism”).
I do hope they look deeper into his online associations. I read on another forum about two other incidents in the northern US (WI or MN, idr) where people like Conditt accidentally blew themselves up while making homemade bombs (in one case, authorities condemned and destroyed the entire apartment building because it was too dangerous to dismantle the apartment of the guy with the chemistry degree). The FBI/whoever needs to make sure that there’s no organization, however loose, behind this stuff.
^Good point. It sounds like the police still can’t figure out how he had the skill to make the bombs.
The Tsarnaevs were called “terrorists” the minute they were identified, before we heard a word from them.
^ It was pretty obvious once they were identified.
Ugh, CBS and the Washington Post have released the name of the roommate. 
Uhg indeed. Friends of ours had a son who was very close with Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, the Columbine shooters. They had media on their doorstep for months after the attack. The kid’s life was derailed and it took him years to recover.
Well, the roommate’s mother talked to the media. I don’t see the name of the other roommate anywhere.
"momofthreeboys: A kid to anyone my age but yes…a legal adult and deranged. A shame that abnormalities weren’t identified earlier so he could potentially get help before he terrorized his town. My sympathies lie with his family and friends who are left with the “what if’s.” "
Who is dropping the ball along the way and why? So many signs with all these whacked out kids, and no one does anything until afterward. The school officers and the FBI stood down more than one incident, from what I read.
Yet now we have marches and outrage and this has been happening for 20 years.
Why do we (as a society) keep dropping the ball? That’s my question, and the one no one really is interested in exploring, from what I can tell. What are we (as a society) doing to these kids that this occurrence is regular?
I don’t know the answer, but I suppose it lies in people’s - teacher, friends, acquaintances - hesitancy to have conversations about a kid that isn’t normative. It’s even getting harder in the public schools with all the inclusion activity that has taken pace in the last couple decades. Non normative behavior is just more accepted. A good thing but also might be causing kids who could use help to slip through the cracks. My oldest kid, when in K-4, had a report card that included things like social behavior, empathy, and a bunch of more psycho-social comments. I don’t think they do that anymore and I don’t recall that with my 3rd who is a decade younger. I’m only guessing that those types of conversations occur with exceptional students. Tougher in this case, because this kid was home schooled so sheltered from teachers or people who might have talked to the parents about their son or picked up clues from his writing, class commenting, etc . But also as someone pointed out, it’s possible he was psychopathic for a long time…or a short time although there are recent studies saying that there are signals at a young age.
It’s not that easy. Non-normal behavior, or even raging, is a long way from shooting up a school or planting bombs. Besides that, our mental health care in this country is a disgrace (for lots of reasons) and what are you going to do once you decide a young adult (or anyone) might be a risk based on some behavioral signs? Lock them up? What about due process? I don’t know the answer. I wish I did. I have family members and co-workers/friends with family members who had some anger issues and trouble coping with some situations, but there haven’t been any attacks on the public! How do you decide?