Mass shooting in Maine

[Kanin]

2 minutes ago, MEmama said:

Ugh, I hate they had class today. 😞 The schools here are all still closed. I can't imagine anyone being  able to concentrate.

I'm trying to decide if I should run an errand. I'm out of meds and logically I know the guy is unlikely to go into the shop but also it's just a few miles from where his car was found so...

I think you should go get the meds. The risk is so small, and you need the meds.

My personal guess is that he's trying to stay away from people as much as possible. 

[MEmama]

4 minutes ago, Kanin said:

I think you should go get the meds. The risk is so small, and you need the meds.

My personal guess is that he's trying to stay away from people as much as possible. 

Logically, my brain agrees. My anxiety not so much, lol.

I've been thinking about you this morning--did your school open? How are your students handling it? 

[Kanin]

2 minutes ago, MEmama said:

Logically, my brain agrees. My anxiety not so much, lol.

I've been thinking about you this morning--did your school open? How are your students handling it? 

No school again today. We're kind of on the border between where schools are closed and where schools are open. I wonder if the staff will have a harder time than the kids. Guess we'll find out on Monday.

[MEmama]

2 minutes ago, Kanin said:

No school again today. We're kind of on the border between where schools are closed and where schools are open. I wonder if the staff will have a harder time than the kids. Guess we'll find out on Monday.

True, it's probably a lot more for adults to process. Especially if the kids aren't directly affected, things like this can seem pretty ambiguous.

I'm glad you don't have class today though. More time for you to snuggle your new kitten!

[pinball]

58 minutes ago, Kanin said:

If the bad guy had had a less powerful gun, things would have been different, too.

My post was in direct response to the post that said there were no good guys there

which was obviously, patently WRONG

[Harriet Vane]

8 minutes ago, pinball said:

My post was in direct response to the post that said there were no good guys there

which was obviously, patently WRONG

I don't think she was contradicting you. She was adding valid information to the discussion.

[hshibley]

7 minutes ago, pinball said:

My post was in direct response to the post that said there were no good guys there

which was obviously, patently WRONG

Your narrative is false. The narrative that if there is a good guy with a gun this tragedy doesn’t happen. The only responsible party here is Mr Card and his gun. Without the gun the young man who charged with a knife probably lives. Yes the young man was a hero who needlessly died because of our fetish with guns. A bar full of people easily overpowers a lone crazed man. Give that man a gun and many people die. 

[pinball]

1 minute ago, hshibley said:

Your narrative is false. The narrative that if there is a good guy with a gun this tragedy doesn’t happen. The only responsible party here is Mr Card and his gun. Without the gun the young man who charged with a knife probably lives. Yes the young man was a hero who needlessly died because of our fetish with guns. A bar full of people easily overpowers a lone crazed man. Give that man a gun and many people die. 

That’s not my narrative…

nice try, tho…and typical of the board. 

[hshibley]

3 hours ago, pinball said:

One of the victim’s, Joe Walker, who died grabbed a knife and rushed towards the killer but was shot twice in the abdomen and died. The state police told his father this. The father said he wasn’t surprised his son would do that.

"No, not at all," Leroy Walker said. "I know he would do that to protect his people.“

https://www.wmur.com/article/lewiston-maine-shooting-victim-stories-102623/45657709#

XXXXXX

Me again:

If Joe Walker had a different weapon, the outcome could have been reversed.

 

 

 

This is what you literally wrote. You switch the responsible party from Mr Card to Mr Walker. You are taking the focus off of Mr Card to advance your agenda. 
 

 

[bolt.]

I'm confused about the prevalence and persistence of the expectation that a 'good guy' using a firearm of their own can stop mass shootings. If it was true, wouldn't you expect evidence? Of all the news reports out of the USA of mass shootings in the past 5-10 years, I can vaguely recall maybe one report that it was halted by an armed bystander/civilian. All the data says that this is not typically how mass shootings are halted. Why the continued expectation?

But there's also a problem with the idea that 'if we didn't have AR15s, we wouldn't have this problem'. Maybe there's an argument for lower damage rates with less powerful weapons, but shooters are always going to choose the most effective available weapon to accomplish their goals. They aren't going to give up because they can't have a specific gun.

Edited October 27, 2023 by bolt.

[KSera]

13 minutes ago, pinball said:

That’s not my narrative…

nice try, tho…and typical of the board. 

Maybe you could explain your narrative better then. Perhaps you’re not intending for your posts in this thread to all give the impression that you find current gun regulation sufficient. 

[pinball]

2 minutes ago, KSera said:

Maybe you could explain your narrative better then. Perhaps you’re not intending for your posts in this thread to all give the impression that you find current gun regulation sufficient. 

No thanks, especially not to you.

This shooting fit the board’s narrative and that is all anyone sees.

my town had a mass shooting with double digit deaths and NOT ONE THREAD was started here about it.

why not? It was national news for MONTHS. 
 

no one here cared enough to post one damn thing

[Dmmetler]

29 minutes ago, bolt. said:

I'm confused about the prevalence and persistence of the expectation that a 'good guy' using a firearm of their can stop mass shootings. If it was true, wouldn't you expect evidence? Of all the news reports out of the USA of mass shootings in the past 5-10 years, I can vaguely recall maybe one report that it was halted by an armed bystander/civilian. All the data says that this is not typically how mass shootings are halted. Why the continued expectation?

But there's also a problem with the idea that 'if we didn't have AR15s, we wouldn't have this problem'. Maybe there's an argument for lower damage rates with less powerful weapons, but shooters are always going to choose the most effective available weapon to accomplish their goals. They aren't going to give up because they can't have a specific gun.

No, but at least fewer people die and there's more chance for LEO's to intervene. There are still violence events in other countries with much stronger gun laws, but usually a lot fewer people end up dead. An AR-15 or similar can kill a lot more people faster than a shotgun or hand gun, and a shotgun or handgun can kill more people faster than a knife or bottle of acid. One of the people quoted here (in TN, not on this board) after Covenant said something like "The killer would have driven their car into the playground to get those kids". And yes, they could have. But first they'd have had to go over a curb and through the fence, and probably that would have given people time to scatter and would have reduced the speed the car was going. Fewer would have died. 

 

We're never going to completely get rid of violence, or mental illness. But we can make it less likely that someone who is hearing voices telling them to kill large numbers of people is able to do so quite so easily. 

Edited October 27, 2023 by Dmmetler

[ScoutTN]

2 hours ago, bolt. said:

But there's also a problem with the idea that 'if we didn't have AR15s, we wouldn't have this problem'. Maybe there's an argument for lower damage rates with less powerful weapons, but shooters are always going to choose the most effective available weapon to accomplish their goals. They aren't going to give up because they can't have a specific gun.

True, but if semi-automatic weapons, especially those with large magazines, were not easily and legally available, these scenarios could play out very differently. I’ll take incremental improvement over none. 

Edited October 27, 2023 by ScoutTN
Punctuation.

[ScoutTN]

3 minutes ago, pinball said:

No thanks, especially not to you.

This shooting fit the board’s narrative and that is all anyone sees.

my town had a mass shooting with double digit deaths and NOT ONE THREAD was started here about it.

why not? It was national news for MONTHS. 
 

no one here cared enough to post one damn thing

Why didn’t you post about it?

[KSera]

3 minutes ago, pinball said:

No thanks, especially not to you.

This shooting fit the board’s narrative and that is all anyone sees.

my town had a mass shooting with double digit deaths and NOT ONE THREAD was started here about it.

why not? It was national news for MONTHS. 
 

no one here cared enough to post one damn thing

I’m sorry this happened near you as well. It’s quite possible the discussion took place in the politics club instead of chat. I’m certain there was not a mass shooting that no one here cared “a damn thing” about. 
 

You seem to dislike this board so much and think so little of the people here. 

[bolt.]

5 minutes ago, KSera said:

I’m sorry this happened near you as well. It’s quite possible the discussion took place in the politics club instead of chat. I’m certain there was not a mass shooting that no one here cared “a damn thing” about. 
 

You seem to dislike this board so much and think so little of the people here. 

I'm certain there are maybe hundreds (or at least dozens) of mass shootings (depending on the definitions) per year that get little or no discussion on the board. This one came up because it's in the double digits, and the shooter is still at large. Lots of somewhat less serious shootings are so par-for-the-course that there is little to say about them. We care, but we don't always discuss.

[pinball]

19 minutes ago, ScoutTN said:

Why didn’t you post about it?

Because I was caring for a family member having a serious medical event at the same time it happened. I wasn’t online for a while

Im sure that’s not “good enough” for you

[pgr]

6 minutes ago, bolt. said:

I'm certain there are maybe hundreds (or at least dozens) of mass shootings (depending on the definitions) per year that get little or no discussion on the board. This one came up because it's in the double digits, and the shooter is still at large. Lots of somewhat less serious shootings are so par-for-the-course that there is little to say about them. We care, but we don't always discuss.

There's also a massive manhunt still underway, with a shooter that is an incredible marksman, a skilled outdoorsman, and by all accounts - a meticulous planner. 

[KSera]

8 hours ago, Corraleno said:

 

I wonder why they seem to have dropped the search for his boat? Apparently his car was found abandoned at a boat dock the night of the shooting and they were searching for a specific boat, but I haven't seen any followup on that. 

 

 

It sounds like they are searching the water now. Perhaps they first wanted to focus all efforts on where he might be alive and still a risk before diverting resources to looking for him in the water? Just speculation on that. 

[MEmama]

According to the latest news update, they will be sending scuba divers down to scour the river.

 

State police plan to send divers into Androscoggin River 

10:15 a.m. Maine Department of Public Safety Commissioner Michael Sauschuck said police are putting a dive team into the Androscoggin River near where Card’s vehicle was found at a boat launch at 501 Lisbon Street.

– Julia Arenstam (Press Herald) 

Edited October 27, 2023 by MEmama

[MEmama]

for a bit of context on place: 

Rough terrain likely complicating search

11:20 a.m. The search for Robert Card has been complicated by landscape and geography of central Maine, which in places is heavily forested and hilly. Amy Lawson, a registered Maine guide with Gravel Road Guide Service, said it can very difficult to find someone in the Maine woods.

“Last summer, we had an adult hide-and seek game in the woods where we had 10 people. In one hour, we found one person,” Lawson said.

Around Lewiston and Bowdoin, where Card grew up and his family still lives, the landscape is varied, with residential areas as well as farms and fields and stretches of heavily wooded areas, where many trees have not yet dropped their leaves. Those wooded areas are crisscrossed with snowmobile trails and logging trails and woods that no one has traversed in years.

Lawson pointed to the case of Geraldine Largay, a thru-hiker on the Appalachian Trial, who strayed from the trail and was reported missing in July 2013. Her body was found two years later.

The region is also marked with lakes and ponds, as well as rivers, which are the focus of Friday’s search by law enforcement officials; Card’s vehicle was found at a boat ramp on the Androscoggin River in Lisbon.

Maine’s deer hunting season starts Saturday.

[fraidycat]

1 hour ago, pinball said:

No thanks, especially not to you.

This shooting fit the board’s narrative and that is all anyone sees.

my town had a mass shooting with double digit deaths and NOT ONE THREAD was started here about it.

why not? It was national news for MONTHS. 
 

no one here cared enough to post one damn thing

Was that one of the over 500 - that's FIVE HUNDRED -mass shootings in 2023 in the USA? 
 

Five. 
HUNDRED.

In less than a year.

We do not have a thread about every one of them. However, they all have one thing in common: Guns. 
 

And if any single one of them had been stopped by a "good guy with a gun" it would be all. over. everything. Every news outlet, social media site, and billboard would be bombarded with the "see, told ya the good guys NEED their guns" narrative.

Where was the good guy with the gun in your town's shooting? Had other plans? Couldn't make it that day? 

You didn't start the thread, either, so I assume the good guy with a gun must've been busy. 

Edited October 27, 2023 by fraidycat

[pinball]

4 minutes ago, fraidycat said:

Was that one of the over 500 - that's FIVE HUNDRED -mass shootings in 2023 in the USA? 
 

Five. 
HUNDRED.

In less than a year.

We do not have a thread about every one of them. However, they all have one thing in common: Guns. 
 

And if any single one of them had been stopped by a "good guy with a gun" it would be all. over. everything. Every news outlet, social media site, and billboard would be bombarded with the "see, told ya the good guys NEED their guns" narrative.

Where was the good guy with the gun in your town's shooting? Had other plans? Couldn't make it that day? 

You didn't start the thread, either, so I assume the good guy with a gun must've been busy. 

Let me be the first to just 

❤️❤️❤️❤️

your post

[Frances]

1 hour ago, pinball said:

No thanks, especially not to you.

This shooting fit the board’s narrative and that is all anyone sees.

my town had a mass shooting with double digit deaths and NOT ONE THREAD was started here about it.

why not? It was national news for MONTHS. 
 

no one here cared enough to post one damn thing

So why didn’t you start a post about it? The mass shootings in the US have become so common that if there are other major news stories at the same time, they likely don’t revive as much attention. Since I have no idea where you live, I don’t know if you are insinuating that people on this board don’t care about your particular area or something else. I’m not sure what point you are trying to make, maybe you could clarify.

[Ting Tang]

Well, maybe those two men who tried to charge the gunman might have been able to shoot him down.  We will never know because that was not the scenario.  I believe there are capable people of doing so; they're just not in that place at that time.  Who really knows.  We don't have full time police protection, so I understand wanting a chance to protect yourself.  But the bad guys are still getting guns.  And there are so many of them, even new laws are not curbing it.  Illinois has a gun ban now....and...

We had a woman shot dead in a nearby town that had been kidnapped by her ex-boyfriend in Michigan. She was a nursing student, and he was a practicing OB/GYN.  She had left the abusive relationship.  Could he have been stopped sooner?

Another woman was recently injured in a domestic dispute by her partner's gun.  

Oh, I am not supposed to genderize this, though women are 5 times more likely to be shot than men in domestic disputes if their partners have guns.

Someone here also got shot by accident in a popular lunch spot.  He did get a felony charge.

These things all add up.

[Kanin]

1 hour ago, pinball said:

No thanks, especially not to you.

This shooting fit the board’s narrative and that is all anyone sees.

my town had a mass shooting with double digit deaths and NOT ONE THREAD was started here about it.

why not? It was national news for MONTHS. 
 

no one here cared enough to post one damn thing

I'm really sorry that happened in your town. It's awful. I would have certainly talked about it. 

Like someone else said, I think these events are so common nowadays that we can't even keep up with where they're happening. That's just really, really sad.

[KSera]

15 minutes ago, Ting Tang said:

Well, maybe those two men who tried to charge the gunman might have been able to shoot him down.  We will never know because that was not the scenario.  I believe there are capable people of doing so; they're just not in that place at that time.  Who really knows.  We don't have full time police protection, so I understand wanting a chance to protect yourself.  But the bad guys are still getting guns.  And there are so many of them, even new laws are not curbing it.  Illinois has a gun ban now....and...

We had a woman shot dead in a nearby town that had been kidnapped by her ex-boyfriend in Michigan. She was a nursing student, and he was a practicing OB/GYN.  She had left the abusive relationship.  Could he have been stopped sooner?

Another woman was recently injured in a domestic dispute by her partner's gun.  

Oh, I am not supposed to genderize this, though women are 5 times more likely to be shot than men in domestic disputes if their partners have guns.

Someone here also got shot by accident in a popular lunch spot.  He did get a felony charge.

These things all add up.

It's true that this could have been one of those rare instances where someone with a gun was able to reduce the number of fatalities that otherwise would have happened. It does happen on rare occasions (though as someone else said, the chances are high that there were some "good guys with guns" there, and yet.... Showing that the myth doesn't work the way people think it would or should). But since no one knows where or when one of these attacks is going to happen, the fact still remains that the presence of a gun in a home or on a person increases the risk rather than decreasing it. So the gamble is unlikely to pay off. We hear about it when it does, but mostly it doesn't or goes the other way. It would be kind of like not wearing your seatbelt because occasionally one of those accidents happens where the person only survived because they were unrestrained and thrown from the burning car or some such.

 

Illinois (and other states who have put stricter laws in place) suffers from the poor laws of surrounding states. Illinois imported guns from surrounding states at the third highest rate in the nation in 2021 (https://giffords.org/lawcenter/gun-laws/states/illinois/)

 

[MercyA]

2 hours ago, pinball said:

This shooting fit the board’s narrative and that is all anyone sees.

my town had a mass shooting with double digit deaths and NOT ONE THREAD was started here about it.

I'm so sorry for what happened in your town. 😞 

If the story "fits a narrative," it's because the same thing keeps happening over and over and over.

We are not monolithic in our views here. We all just want this to *stop*. Obviously whatever needs to be done hasn't been done yet. 

[Grace Hopper]

8 hours ago, Eos said:

I agree he died a hero.  His bestie also charged the shooter, carrying nothing with him.  As a Quaker, I don't think people should walk around ready at a moment's notice to kill others by carrying loaded guns and the mindset that they will kill when the time arises because I think the unspooled version of that ends with the possibility of mass shooting deaths.  As a Mainer, I know many many many people who own lots of guns who would leap into action to save others.  I wonder - on sort of a meta-level - if the basic human mentality to help others, especially children, is incompatible with the mental acuity it takes to load, aim, and shoot while processing the horror going on.

I don't want to argue about whether good guys with guns save people.  We can see that idea has yet to be proven.

Something not mentioned herein is that any “good guy” wielding a weapon when the LEOs show up could easily be mistaken for a shooter and extinguished at the scene. And 9/10ths of the people I know who proudly conceal carry also do NOT train regularly. I don’t trust such “good guys” to be  sufficiently swift or accurate. I only trust those such as police/former police who are consistently training with their handguns. 

7 hours ago, MercyA said:

Nice summation. 😞

And I think with disgust of  congressmen walking around with AR15 lapel pins. It’s shameful. 

6 hours ago, Kanin said:

If the bad guy had had a less powerful gun, things would have been different, too.

Yes. No ordinary citizen needs a military grade assault weapon. 

4 hours ago, pgr said:

There's also a massive manhunt still underway, with a shooter that is an incredible marksman, a skilled outdoorsman, and by all accounts - a meticulous planner. 

This man seems different than other shooters in that he didn’t go down shooting at the scene. I suppose with previous self harm thoughts expressed, it’s likely his body will be found in the river. But it’s haunting to think he just melted into the landscape and could pop back up violently somewhere else. 
 

 

Edited October 27, 2023 by Grace Hopper

[mommyoffive]

7 minutes ago, Grace Hopper said:

Something not mentioned herein is that any “good guy” wielding a weapon when the LEOs show up could easily be mistaken for a shooter and extinguished at the scene. And 9/10ths of the people I know who proudly conceal carry also do NOT train regularly. I don’t trust such “good guys” to be  sufficiently swift or accurate. I only trust those such as police/former police who are consistently training with their handguns. 

And I think with disgust of  congressmen walking around with AR15 lapel pins. It’s shameful. 

Yes. No ordinary citizen needs a military grade assault weapon. 

This man seems different than other shooters in that he didn’t go down shooting at the scene. I suppose with previous self harm thoughts expressed, it’s likely his body will be found in the river. But it’s haunting to think he just melted into the landscape and could pop back up violently somewhere else. 
 

 

Agree 1000%.  I say this all the time.  

[Wheres Toto]

All the "good guys" with guns in Uvalde certainly didn't help. 

[Corraleno]

There have been mass shootings at places with armed security guards — and they got shot, too. Because when someone suddenly appears out of nowhere and starts spraying the area with a gun that can empty an extended magazine of 60 bullets in less than 60 seconds, the chances of a "good guy" being able to immediately and accurately assess the situation, pull a handgun out of his pants, aim perfectly, and get off a kill shot before the gunman has already shot dozens of people (likely including him) and without hitting any innocent bystanders, is really really low. In most cases, the guy with a gun who suddenly finds himself in a mass shooting situation is going to do the same thing as all the people without guns — panic and do whatever they can to get the hell out of there alive. 

And the issue with AR15s isn't just the number of bullets and the speed of shooting, it's also the caliber and velocity of the bullets, which will literally shred human bone and tissue. This WaPo article has some excellent animations and illustrations showing the difference between the damage done by a handgun and an AR15: "The speed at impact creates a blast effect, like the wake that follows a boat, causing internal injuries far outside the bullet’s path."

The whole "good guy with a gun" narrative is built on a fantasy that shoot outs are like old Western movies, and if only the local Gary Cooper look-alike was armed, he'd take down that bad guy that was shootin' up the town. That's not how things work in a world where mentally ill and politically radicalized people can easily and legally buy weapons of war.

[Faith-manor]

2 hours ago, Corraleno said:

There have been mass shootings at places with armed security guards — and they got shot, too. Because when someone suddenly appears out of nowhere and starts spraying the area with a gun that can empty an extended magazine of 60 bullets in less than 60 seconds, the chances of a "good guy" being able to immediately and accurately assess the situation, pull a handgun out of his pants, aim perfectly, and get off a kill shot before the gunman has already shot dozens of people (likely including him) and without hitting any innocent bystanders, is really really low. In most cases, the guy with a gun who suddenly finds himself in a mass shooting situation is going to do the same thing as all the people without guns — panic and do whatever they can to get the hell out of there alive. 

And the issue with AR15s isn't just the number of bullets and the speed of shooting, it's also the caliber and velocity of the bullets, which will literally shred human bone and tissue. This WaPo article has some excellent animations and illustrations showing the difference between the damage done by a handgun and an AR15: "The speed at impact creates a blast effect, like the wake that follows a boat, causing internal injuries far outside the bullet’s path."

The whole "good guy with a gun" narrative is built on a fantasy that shoot outs are like old Western movies, and if only the local Gary Cooper look-alike was armed, he'd take down that bad guy that was shootin' up the town. That's not how things work in a world where mentally ill and politically radicalized people can easily and legally buy weapons of war.

People have watched Bruce Willis movies as though they are documentaries. Sigh. No. John McLain does not save the day. The neighbor is not Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible. But, my nephew "a responsible gun owner" managed to accidentally discharge his firearm while cleaning it, narrowly missing (literally by an inch) his pregnant wife and 6 year old daughter. This is the more likely scenario than "good guy civilian with a gun takes out the bad guy".

 

Edited October 28, 2023 by Faith-manor

[Catwoman]

The shooter is dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. They just found his body.

[Starr]

Thank you for the update .

[Ting Tang]

9 hours ago, KSera said:

It's true that this could have been one of those rare instances where someone with a gun was able to reduce the number of fatalities that otherwise would have happened. It does happen on rare occasions (though as someone else said, the chances are high that there were some "good guys with guns" there, and yet.... Showing that the myth doesn't work the way people think it would or should). But since no one knows where or when one of these attacks is going to happen, the fact still remains that the presence of a gun in a home or on a person increases the risk rather than decreasing it. So the gamble is unlikely to pay off. We hear about it when it does, but mostly it doesn't or goes the other way. It would be kind of like not wearing your seatbelt because occasionally one of those accidents happens where the person only survived because they were unrestrained and thrown from the burning car or some such.

 

Illinois (and other states who have put stricter laws in place) suffers from the poor laws of surrounding states. Illinois imported guns from surrounding states at the third highest rate in the nation in 2021 (https://giffords.org/lawcenter/gun-laws/states/illinois/)

 

Yes to all. Every time I want to go do something fun, I always feel it’s a gamble. I also hate the fact abusive men are still shooting their obsessions. My husband just says it’s best not to leave home or go places. What a way to live. 

[mommyoffive]

1 hour ago, Catwoman said:

The shooter is dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. They just found his body.

I am glad that this is over and people in Maine don't have to keep worrying about him.

Maine Shootings Suspect Robert Card Found Dead (people.com)

[Ausmumof3]

I’m so glad this is over. Hopefully everyone not directly affected can breathe a sigh of relief and get on with life. 

Edited October 28, 2023 by Ausmumof3

[MEmama]

Huge relief.

But, this is going to take a long time to process and Lewiston and the entire state will never be quite the same. 18 lives disappeared, the entire area is traumatized. Of all tucked away corners of the world, this was never "supposed to happen here". 
 

Maine people are tough and community ties us all together. But this is going to a long time before healing can begin. Today is a day to process, to feel, to cry with all the emotions. It's a day to talk with neighbors and look at wonder at the sunshine through the glorious fall leaves and the sea crashing on the rocks, to feel hope and despair and grief.

 

 

[Kassia]

1 hour ago, MEmama said:

Huge relief.

But, this is going to take a long time to process and Lewiston and the entire state will never be quite the same. 18 lives disappeared, the entire area is traumatized. Of all tucked away corners of the world, this was never "supposed to happen here". 
 

Maine people are tough and community ties us all together. But this is going to a long time before healing can begin. Today is a day to process, to feel, to cry with all the emotions. It's a day to talk with neighbors and look at wonder at the sunshine through the glorious fall leaves and the sea crashing on the rocks, to feel hope and despair and grief.

 

 

You are exactly right.  This isn't over for your community and it will take a long time to heal and things will never feel the same.  😞  

 

After the high school shooting in our little *safe* town, there was a big increase in suicides and overdoses for a long time.  People really struggled.  It truly affects everyone, although some much more than others obviously.  

Sending hugs to you @MEmama and thinking of all affected.  Such a horrible tragedy, but I'm glad he's been found.

 

ETA - that feeling of " this isn't supposed to happen here" is just one of the many many things people have to process.  I know I really struggled with this - partly because I wanted to move here since I thought it was a safe place to raise kids and they ended up being traumatized and one was there where the shooting occurred.  In addition to everything else, I grieved that I wasn't able to raise my kids in a safe place.  I had a traumatic childhood and one thing that was healing for me was that my kids felt safe.  That, of course, was ripped away when the shooting happened.  

Edited October 28, 2023 by Kassia

[Dmmetler]

The good guy with a gun narrative would make more sense if we had limits on the kind of guns thar can be purchased and took efforts to reduce the number of the AR-15 type in circulation.  I read mysteries, and one thing that happens regularly is for the protagonist to be held at gun point and to dodge out of the way and end up with a non-fatal wound (or missed entirely) WHILE disarming the shooter. And honestly, those are starting to feel like period pieces, just like horror movies where the landline doesn't work to call for help. Because just like it's pretty much impossible to shut down all outside communications now. It's also pretty much impossible to dodge a spray of bullets from an AR-15. 

[Heartstrings]

27 minutes ago, Dmmetler said:

The good guy with a gun narrative would make more sense if we had limits on the kind of guns thar can be purchased and took efforts to reduce the number of the AR-15 type in circulation.  I read mysteries, and one thing that happens regularly is for the protagonist to be held at gun point and to dodge out of the way and end up with a non-fatal wound (or missed entirely) WHILE disarming the shooter. And honestly, those are starting to feel like period pieces, just like horror movies where the landline doesn't work to call for help. Because just like it's pretty much impossible to shut down all outside communications now. It's also pretty much impossible to dodge a spray of bullets from an AR-15. 

That was the “reason”given by the cops in Uvalde for not going in after the shooter.  They were afraid of the AR, while carrying their own ARs with vests and helmets.  People who think a good guy with a gun can save the day are picturing 6-shooters in the tavern at the OK Corral.   

Edited October 28, 2023 by Heartstrings

[MEmama]

1 hour ago, Kassia said:

You are exactly right.  This isn't over for your community and it will take a long time to heal and things will never feel the same.  😞  

 

After the high school shooting in our little *safe* town, there was a big increase in suicides and overdoses for a long time.  People really struggled.  It truly affects everyone, although some much more than others obviously.  

Sending hugs to you @MEmama and thinking of all affected.  Such a horrible tragedy, but I'm glad he's been found.

 

ETA - that feeling of " this isn't supposed to happen here" is just one of the many many things people have to process.  I know I really struggled with this - partly because I wanted to move here since I thought it was a safe place to raise kids and they ended up being traumatized and one was there where the shooting occurred.  In addition to everything else, I grieved that I wasn't able to raise my kids in a safe place.  I had a traumatic childhood and one thing that was healing for me was that my kids felt safe.  That, of course, was ripped away when the shooting happened.  

Sending you much love @Kassia ❤️💔

[Kassia]

1 hour ago, MEmama said:

Sending you much love @Kassia ❤️💔

Thank you.  right back at you as you grieve and process the horror that happened.  Again, I'm so sorry. 

[ScoutTN]

3 hours ago, Heartstrings said:

That was the “reason”given by the cops in Uvalde for not going in after the shooter.  They were afraid of the AR, while carrying their own ARs with vests and helmets.  People who think a good guy with a gun can save the day are picturing 6-shooters in the tavern at the OK Corral.   

The police in Uvalde were cowards that day. 
 

Thankful the police here behaved very differently.

[mom31257]

I'm so sorry this happened, and I'm glad the event is over. I pray that all those affected will find some kind of peace eventually, but I know that will probably take a lot of time. 

 

[Pam in CT]

@MEmama ...

 

... after you and your neighbors have had a chance to breathe again...

... and the vigils and services for the dead are held...

... and the students are back to school...

... and you and your neighbors turn to the work of processing the pain and anger and that loss of "not here" innocence, and figuring out how to transform it all into some kind of fuel to Do Something and thereafter how to sift what can be done and how...

... feel free to PM me and I'll share the long form version of what faith institutitions, community centers and libraries, schools and mom book groups did following Sandy Hook that ultimately, slowly, morphed into a series of state legislation and the emergence of one of my Senators in particular as the leading workhorse in the US Senate on this issue (Chris Murphy).  I've shared the short form on this board a couple of times in the aftermath of other massacres but would be very glad to share what I learned throughout the process we went through.

 

(( hugs )) on getting through Part I of the process.

[KSera]

The new details coming out about the shooter’s history illustrate the problem with having yellow flag laws versus red flag laws. His ex wife and son reported concerns to the police at the beginning of the year including that he was collecting guns at the house. Other family members contacted police after that and said they would try to secure the weapons. Police finally tried making contact in July but were unable to. It doesn’t appear there’s anything in the law that allows them to do anything beyond that. They would have had to be able to take him into custody in order to pursue the yellow flag route. With red flag laws, the calls back in May from his ex-wife could have allowed them to collect his weapons.

Police Were Told Maine Gunman Had Threatened to Carry Out Shooting Spree

[Starr]

Add me in to the once removed list of people who know someone who died in this terrible shooting. Tragic