Virginia Tech Tragedy

“My deepest condolences to all involved with yesterdays tragic events...


This past summer I met a few PhD students and faculty from Virginia Tech and pray that they are all safe.

Very scary for all students, parents, and faculty at all universities...”

“I usually get really pissed and angry at s&#@ like this when it happens, but for some reason, this time, I just got really almost physically sickened by it.”

“It is sad that there are people like that on this planet.”

“All these stories in the paper keep referring to it as the worst shooting in "Modern" US history. I don't get the modern part. was there a time when some dude went ape #&%!$ with a flintlock?”

“Awful - I can't imagine what it would be like if this happened where I teach.

I was at UT Austin long after Whitman's seige and the scars were still there. Wish I had better words, but words here won't do much anyways.”

“Unbelievably sad...”

“I have been very upset over this. my heart goes out to that entire community.

My campus came out quickly with an explanation of how prepared we are for something like this....bullsh*t. Universities are very vulnerable to thieves, rapists, and other kooks.”

“You got it Phil.

There seem to be "professionals" who work the numerous college libraries in my area stealing laptops and such.
We are soft targets.

The kids here are dismayed and shocked.”

“Anybody know if the killer is a marksman or not. Seems in most mass shootings....there's more injured than dead. In this case there seems to be more killed than injured.....or at least the kill percentage is very high.”

“Where is Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson?

The largest racial attack in the history of the United States and these racists clam up?”

“Thanks for the levity hyway. I must admit that I LOL'd at the flintlock comment.

The media are just a bunch of idiots. One of the national shows did a whole long thing about security and having swipe cards to get in places. Uhh, this dude was a student. He would've swipped his card, gone in a building that he had access to, and then gone nuts. College campuses are full of weirdos. I don't know if they're any more than the population in general, but they do tend to stand out more.”

“If they had an idea who might have been involved in the first shooting they could remove his access code from the entire system and he'd be locked out of every building on campus... IF they had that sort of security system.

'Kill Percentage'? Sounds twisted.”

“True, but they didn't have a clue about who it was at that point. Early reports had the dorm shooter as Caucasion and classroom shooter as Asian.”

“The media are just a bunch of idiots.

As bad as I feel about this and how horrible it is I am already tired to effing death of hearing about it from the damn media. And now they are all donning their hindsight glasses looking to place place blame. The funniest thing is the media is sitting around saying, "Couldn't we profile these types of nuts?". Some guy goes cookoo for coco puffs, kills 33 people and the media is wanting everyone who seeks council ling or writes a dark paper to be profiled? Yet 19 Muslims fly planes into the Towers killing 3,000 but when anyone even suggests profiling them they cream racism.”

“Replaying the material sent to NBC just gives the sick #&%!$ a platform. He already said he was inspired by Columbine ---”

“they CREAM racism? Theres a joke there somewhere.

I agree on the hindsight glasses. It drives me nuts when some unfortunate event happens and all the suddent the rules police come out. You have a knee jerk reaction because some weird set of coincidences line up and a freak occurance happens. Now, each one of those little issues get banned. Not totally talking about this particular situation.”

“On most if not all college campuses dormatories and classroom buildings are locked at night and open during daytime hours.
Let the "blamers" and flamers run their stupid mouths.

There is a nut who frequents our library who is in his '40s and complains about not finding a good job even after completing an advanced degree.
He bad-mouths some of the English professors and even wrote a story naming these same people in which they all died, violently.
He talked about beating the crap out of one of my co-workers who is about 30+ and is a prolific poet and writer and organizes readings and is active in his craft.
This nut lives with his parents and is clearly un-balanced. That is probably why he can't find a good job.
Anybody want to hire him in say, another part of the country??”

““they CREAM racism? Theres a joke there somewhere.

I'll tell ya what, I gotta get a new keyboard. The space bar keeps sticking so my posts end up looking like a mess. So I go back and take out all the spaces .”

“"The largest racial attack in the history of the United States and these racists clam up?”
bacpac
7:04:26 AM
4/19/07

That's gotta be in the top ten of all-time stupid posts on Trail Talk.
Is that what the right-wing blabber-mouths are saying?

I just looked at the list of dead and they are a multi-racial and multi-national group of humans.
I think this sicko just wanted to kill humans.

As far as a "kill ratio" is concerned, the sicko was shooting victims several times each at close range.
I heard a young woman who survived say that everyone around her had at least three or four bullets in them and she was just lucky to have not been hit at all.
The shooter re-entered some rooms to shoot his victims again just for good measure.”

“I'd say it was a class envy killing more than racist. Or the guy was just nuckin' futs.”

“ In this case there seems to be more killed than injured.....or at least the kill percentage is very high. - stanlee

It's a good question and not "twisted" as the retarded Politically Correct police would vilify you on. I've been reading that the students had fewer chances to escape. It wasn't so much shooting at moving targets as it was execution-style shooting.”

“The guy also said things about "decadence".

Maybe a touch of twisted self-righteousness too.

It could be that he had trouble cracking the "nookie code" and with all the presumed hedonistic pursuits that naturally go on in college, petty jealousy had him all ate up.

"Manic depression has captured my soul
I know what I want, but I just don't know
How to go about gettin' it......
Manic depression is a full swing and miss..."

"There's a killer on the road
His brain is squirmin' like a toad."
last edited: 4/19/07 7:32:35 AM”

“Even if they did have swipe cards and he wasn't a student it isn't that hard to get into a secured facility if your intention is to kill people then yourself. A 10 year old with a bow and arrow could get into your average swipe card facility. Have you seen the average door security 'guard' at low security facilities. They aren't the sharpest knives in the drawer. Even if they were alert, the system allows a visitor to walk right up to the guard to get a visitor pass. Bang, guard down, shooter in the building.”

“I had to enter a construction site the other day that had a security gate. As the guy was taking my info I noticed the captain bars on his lapel. If I were a Marine Corp captain and saw bubba with train tracks on his shirt I'd probably either be pissed or laugh like hell.”

“How often have you seen people coming out of a secured facility through a swipecard door (or just a locked from the outside exit door like the night procedures MarkO mentioned) and letting other people enter through it. Even if they wouldn't normally let someone enter after they opened the door would they not let a guy pointing a gun at them enter?”

“Think of all the Seinfeld episodes where they let people in after punching the door code. Elaine would always get mad when someone wouldn't let her in though.”

“After looking at the stills today, I'm just sick. Reminds me of the drill sergeant's last words in "Full Metal Jacket:" "What is your major malfunction, numbnuts? Didn't Mommy and Daddy show you enough attention when you were a child?"”

“As a frequent visitor to Federal and State prisons with Prison Fellowship programming I have seen secure facilities. There is no personal access. Pass slots and massively think glass prevails. There are no points of personal contact Except for a very few individuals who have no control over entry, you have no human contact. Rooms are designed to trap the visitor until they are identified. Until we are willing to accept this level of intervention there is no way of assuring security in public or large open places. Life has risks and there is not much of a way around that.”

“Yep. Famous Last Words.”

“ Prison Fellowship programming - ramblinrev

LOL - "programming". That's pretty accurate, and unusually frank from a religionist. (I still think "brainwashing" is better, though.)”

“oh don't we all just marvel at Mutt's wit....”

“.....his brain is squirmin' like a toad”

“Hey, you're the one that made the Freudian slip. All I did was point it out! LOL”

“flattened on the road.”

“I saw Bacpac's post and replied - now I see this is not a fuego thread, I will place my reply there.
last edited: 4/19/07 5:07:35 PM”

“there are two doors that require student id swipe cards to get to my sons door. i've gone through them every time i've been there....without a swipe card. there are so many kids going in and out it's simple. i could act like i was swiping and walk right through, if i had to. but you don't. just walk up there and someone will hold the door open for you.

unless you want armed guards posted at every entry, you live with the risk that some unbalanced person will #&%!$ things up. that's life.”

“and armed guards would be useless unless they were allowed to be armed guards instead of armed doormen. A shooter could walk up to the average armed guard and cap him before he knew he was in danger. Most armed guards are not standing there with their weapons out and ready to shoot, especially with 100's of students walking by them all day long”

“My heart is heavy today for the souls we lost on that horrible day. My children and I remember.

The Hokie Nation embraces our own and reaches out with open hearts and hands to those who offer their hearts and minds

We are strong
and brave
and innocent
and unafraid

We are better than we think, and
not quite what we want to be

We are alive
to the imagination and the possibilities

We will continue to invent the future
through our blood and tears
Through all this sadness,
We are The Hokies!

Dr. Nikki Giovannai”

“I still use VT colors for my powerpoint when I do an lecture on trauma.”

“I went to VT Saturday with my daughter, she'll be attending in the fall.

”

“Congrats to your daughter, 1camper. With the exception of April 16, 2007, my children had a great experience at Virginia Tech.”

“Aside from the obvious tragedy of it all, this affected me personally in a strange way. I work for a State University in Housing and when it happened, it changed everything. New policies, procedures, security measures, etc. It was kinda weird for awhile, but completely understandable.
The End”

“This attack changed my view of VT. My sister graduated from VT but after this happened it wasn't my first choice for junebug. Hard to explain really, could have happened most anywhere but it left the place with some bad karma. It's a shame to give one nutcase the power to do so much damage to an institution that's so great but I can't get past it.”

“Yes, this tragedy could have happened at virtually any university under the security measures that existed at the time. As you may know, universities across the country changed their policies after that horrible day.

Honestly, you are the first person I have heard say that the place has some bad karma. I have been on campus numerous times since that day and never really felt the bad karma. But I can understand why you are concerned. I mean, your little girl is going off to a big university, and that alone, makes most parents worry.

I was very concerned about my daughter attending such a big place because she is an introvert like me. But as we both found out, the Hokies are an extremely tight knit community. She eventually formed her Virginia Tech family, which was made up of other students in her major, and her fellow teammates on the VT Rowing team.

Thinking about your daughter going off to college reminds me of a note I gave my daughter after I moved her into her dorm the first day. It read "study hard, laugh often, and keep your honor".

Junebug will be fine, 1camper.”

“Totally”

“Thanks CD”