holy shit.

Beyond creepy. Especially the artful picture of all those bullets.

What a loony little weasel.

Holy fuck.

He sent that between shootings?! WTF??

Who was taking photos?

I'm so glad he mentioned Jesus in that second clip; when he was going on about the suffering of his brothers, I started to worry--some of the right wing sites were claiming earlier that he was secretly a Muslim.

Schlussel or whatever her name was was all, "maybe by Asian they mean Paki", because yes, when an American student describes someone as "Asian" they mean "subcontinent."

6: He mentioned Jesus just to throw us off. He's still secretly a Muslim.

No, this was people saying he was secretly Muslim even after they knew who did it.

5: I'm thinking he had it already put together.

The video clips were inline with the manifesto.

There's an asian overachiever joke in here somewhere that I'm simply not going to make.

He also mentioned rich people a lot; when is somebody going to take that and run with it?

Muslims believe in Jesus too, ogged.

My current theory is that he's a nothing who wanted to become a something by doing something. Instead he's a nothing who killed a bunch of people. I won't be looking at his statement.

Does anyone have a link for the video that bypasses the Browser/Flash version check? Because apparently MSNBC wants me to downgrade to Firefox 1.5 and Flash 8.

That is one deeply disturbed individual. Even more so than I thought when all he'd done was shot some girl he was fixated on, her RA, and 30 other people.

Agreed on the having it put together. But I wonder if anyone took the photos, or if he did them all with the time delay shutter.

13: I would estimate that if you wait for an hour or two, this will be on youtube.

In other news... 171 Iraqis dead today in Baghdad.

What a disturbed young man.

I suspect that we have all known people that we thought could snap or suddenly inflict violence on others.

It is frustrating to wonder whether someone could have figured out a way to prevent him from reaching this point.

12: Did you happen to read the story that hilzoy posted?

13: Which link are you clicking? For some reason the "video gallery" link from the front page works for me, although the link in the story doesn't.

19: The video link Ogged posted does a version check and wants me to downgrade. The "video link" on the pictures page is just a Fisher Price link: I click on it, and all it does is change color. Nothing happens.

I guess I'll just have to wait for YouTube.

20: Try the "video gallery" link from the msnbc homepage.

Just once, for me.

It's the stylized nature of the pictures and poses that creeps me out most. I think the same sort of emphasis on style was found at Columbine, and maybe it's always there, but, wow.

He looks like any number of my students.

Of course, YouTube is having other issues right now. But once it comes back, you should be able to see the video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V98VkdNkdlU.

Am I the only one who thinks it might have been more responsible for NBC not to release these photos? He was looking for publicity. Why give it to him? Isn't this just sending the message that this is one way to get it?

25: Yeah, I definitely thought that. But I want such information to get out. Maybe they should embargo it for a while or something, but they should publish it.

And I know they would have eventually made their way into the dark recesses of the internet but why not make people work harder to get it rather than give him a bunch of exposure? I remember news organizations making a decision to do this after Columbine -- they agreed not to run the more "glamorous" photos of Klebold and Harris and to not put them on the cover of magazines.

In the orgy of coverage that's been unleashed, releasing these photos doesn't strike me as particularly worse than a lot of other stuff.

Hmmm. I'm not sure it would serve as an incentive to go on a crazy rampage for anyone who wasn't already over the line, but it does seem like it would just hurt the families of the victims more.

Dude, maybe it's bad to release the photos and video, but come on, I want to see that shit.

The juxtaposition of 29 and 30 tells you more or less all you need to know about the difference between me and Cala.

29: You don't suppose, at engineering schools all over the world, nerds aren't thinking, "WTF?, English major?, 9mm? 32?" and figuring they could beat that?

I suppose we "need" to know, but the high-intensity media circus certainly makes a next one more likely.

25 is exactly right.

32: Not for a minute. "Nerds" isn't co-extensive with "psychopath", so, no.

"Nerds" isn't co-extensive with "psychopath", so, no.

Not co-extensive, but there's enough overlap for government work.

Fewer than 50% of engineering nerds are psychopaths. Does anyone disagree about that?

I think as a compromise they should have released the photos, but should have drawn on them funny little mustaches, and boogers coming from his nose, and maybe drool.

32: Yeah, but they'll only try to beat it in video games.

should have drawn on them funny little mustaches

This would have been hilarious, and maybe the only thing with any deterrent effect on future killers.

In terms of incentive structure it surely makes sense to maximize coverage of the victims and minimize that of the killer, except that all of the interesting questions are about the killer.

35: The thing is, no, there's really not. There's lots of depressed nerds, and lots of engineers, but the few that are psychopaths are surprisingly small percentage of the total (and they seem to be creative writing majors...) I don't think there's a nerd who looks at the coverage and thinks, gee, I was going to get help and try to get laid, but now I'm going to go shoot up the school so two days after I'm dead the nation can be repulsed by me.

Plus, the one manifesto published while the murderer was alive lead to his capture.

I think there's an argument not to publish things like this, but "don't give him the publicity he sought" isn't it. First, the man is dead: nothing anyone does can give him anything at this point. Second, refusing to publish something merely in order to punish someone seems silly.

If publishing this kind of thing arguably serves as an incentive to others--and I suspect on some level it does--that's a good reason not to do it.

If publishing this kind of thing arguably serves as an incentive to others

I'm pretty sure that's what everyone is saying.

Turns out he was committed a couple of years ago.

36: I think that's an unconscionable slander on engineers and in terribly bad taste, John. You suck.

43: But I'm still not clear about why everyone would believe that publishing this particular material, as opposed to all the other stuff about the killings, makes that more likely, even assuming that "incentive" is a concept that's meaningful when we're talking about other people who might do this sort of thing.

Also, based on the font of psychological knowledge that is wikipedia, I don't think "psychopath" is the diagnosis y'all are looking for.

38 makes me wonder when a Virginia Tech video game will be released. With an undocumented back door that allows the player to take the role of the shooter instead of a student trying to stop the shooter.

44: I think that should be grounds for denying someone a gun license. Also, the fact that he was known to have harassed two women should be grounds both to deny him a license and to expel him from the university. The fact that one of the women (at least, from what I've read--dunno about the other) didn't want to press charges shouldn't matter in terms of university policy, I don't think.

And I know what the obvious potential abuses of a policy like that are. But realistically you cannot expect undergraduates to press charges in situations where they think the problem's gone away.

the one manifesto published while the murderer was alive lead to his capture

What does that mean?

48: Oh great, I hadn't thought of that.

45: As opposed to "Also, am I wrong, or is there a disporportionate tendency of teh homocidal crazies in things like tech and engineering students?"?

The link in 44 doesn't say that he was committed, just that he was evaluated by the state and found to be a danger to himself but not others, so they let him go.

44: "They said he also seemed to have an imaginary girlfriend, a supermodel named 'Jelly.' "

48, 51: There's a Columbine flash video game kicking around somewhere (no link b/c I won't google for it from work), where I'm pretty sure you play the shooter.

54 -- I had heard of the Columbine game -- hadn't heard (or had forgotten) you play the shooter.

50: Unabomber. Sent his madness to the NYT, NYT published, his brother and sister-in-law thought, 'holy shit, that might be Ted' and called the FBI.

And I agree with 46.

56 -- oh yeah. Somehow I thought you were still talkin bout the Virginia Tech shooter.

The link in 44 doesn't say that he was committed, just that he was evaluated by the state and found to be a danger to himself but not others, so they let him go.

Not totally clear, right?

It's unclear whether Cho went to the hospital with police on his own or was taken there under protective custody, a possibility under the temporary detention order obtained by police.

When I got to the bits in this sad, mad rant about "You have never felt an ounce of pain your whole life," etc, hatred for the effete snobs, etc, etc, my first thought was, "Hey, that's what John Derbyshire and all the Where-Were-The-Men crowd think, too.

I have a little bit of sympathy for the Derbyshire line, but the argument against it in this case is that it seems like there was heroism, and there might have been more than we know. If someone cares about affirming standards of bravery, they ought to laud the heroes that acted, rather than act like armchair Rambos.

Hilzoy's almost-homicidal friend seems to have used remarkably similar language in describing his state of mind.

I have zero sympathy for the Derbyshire line.

49: There's harrassment and there's harrassment. Have you seen any indication that Cho's actions went beyond acting weird and making people uncomfortable into something a public-university administration could act on? The accounts I've seen of the harrassment seem to suggest that it was creepy but not aggressive and that he stopped bothering the two women who complained when he was called on it. Being a creepy mentally-ill guy is still legal, and most such guys don't end up going postal.

I have zero sympathy for the Derbyshire line.

It depends for me on whether you take his line to be "let's criticize people who were just shot at and had their friends killed for their cowardice" or "let's affirm how we think brave people should act in these situations." I'm on board with the latter, although if I'm remembering the Derbyshire correctly, it was more along the lines of the former.

49: According to the report I heard on the way home, it is, in that state. He lied on the form and the background check didn't catch it 'cause the civil stuff isn't centralized to the degree the criminal records are.

41: I really don't know if nerds have their heads torqued down more or less evenly than English majors but I figure a good C.E. or M.E. could do better.

In any event, my main objection to the coverage is the emphasis on the amount of grief caused. That's what he was looking for and that's what the next one will be looking for. Even nuts don't perform for non-existent audiences, if he thought no one would give a damn he'd have just offed himself. "If it bleeds it leads" is not the best media policy.

I have zero sympathy for it when your idea of heroism is 'count the number of shots and rush the gunman when he reloads', presumably when you don't know what gun the murderer is carrying, how many rounds per clip, and which gun the guy is firing. Thanks, dirty Harry. I have negative sympathy when you do so while overlooking the actual acts of heroism and quick thinking that did occur just because it didn't look like something Chuck Norris would do.

64: I'm not on board with either version.

Derb's line was that someone should have rushed the guy by counting the shots and charging while he reloaded. Plus, it was only a .22 so what's the big deal?

To quote: "Where was the spirit of self-defense here? Setting aside the ludicrous campus ban on licensed conceals, why didn't anyone rush the guy? It's not like this was Rambo, hosing the place down with automatic weapons. He had two handguns for goodness' sake -- one of them reportedly a .22. At the very least, count the shots and jump him reloading or changing hands. Better yet, just jump him. Handguns aren't very accurate, even at close range. I shoot mine all the time at the range, and I still can't hit squat. I doubt this guy was any better than I am. And even if hit, a .22 needs to find something important to do real damage -- your chances aren't bad."

Like I say, zero sympathy.

A bit more: The whole thing is written from the point of view of someone who gets to play the level again. "OK, I got killed the first time, but now I know it was just a couple of .22s and how many bullets are in each magazine, I figure I'll be able to time it right at my next effort."

Thanks, dirty Harry.

I had the exact same thought. "I know you're asking yourself, did he fire 17 shots or was it only 16? Well, do you feel lucky, punk?"

Fucking Derbyshire. Hard to despise him as fully as he deserves because I know a person or two in sort of the some clueless curmudgeon demographic, but what a piece of work.

Ok, what you quoted is stupid; I can't argue.

But the Derb was in a Bruce Lee movie, so his standards are different.

It isn't a strawman if your opponent really is that dumb.

Derbyshire was at his worst with that one. the really objectionable thing was the willingness of so many wingers to jump in right away with a harsh judgement, in ignorance of the facts and terribly insultingly with regard to the victims.

The "counting the shots" thing is bogus. A guy who counted the shots in Portland back around 1980. A guy robbed a convenience store at gunpoint (where my brother worked, as it happened). The clerk, ironically a Korean engineering student, chased the gunman out of the store and was eventually killed. Police speculated that he was counting the shots and wrongly assumed that there were only 6.

In this case the guy had two guns with a total of 29 cartridges, and was able to reload between classrooms. He probably didn't have to reload in any given classroom.

OK fine, B., more than 50% of engineering majors are psychopaths. Have it your way.

Coming from the "it would have been cool if they had rushed the gunman" camp, I will say that Derb took the kernel of a defensible position too far. Even in the best of circumstances, taking some sort of direct action against the shooter would have been a high-pressure, adrenaline-charged decision. Portraying it as a trivial matter involving nothing more difficult than counting shots (which is ridiculous for a variety of reasons: When did he start shooting? How big is his clip? Can you count accurately in such a stressful situation?) is just wrong.

Cool, sure. Anyone who did and survived would be rightly lauded as heroes. But hardly mandatory; and for all we know, a few of the victims did rush the gunman and didn't live to tell about it. The RA in the first shooting seems to have confronted him, at least.

Can the Gerhard Richter paintings of those photos be far behind?

We don't even know that students didn't rush the shooter. The way classrooms are laid out there are a lot of impediments, and he could have shot people one by one as they came near.

I think that when you write all the time for an audience of like-thinkers and admirers, like Derb does at NRO, you get sloppy. You don't make your arguments as carefully as you really should, and you assume your readers will let a lot of stuff slide.

He has quite a low opinion of his readership.

By the way, you can see the video equivalent of #79 here.

Especially if you're a delusional ideologue with personal issues who happens to be quite bright.

82: Which, come to think of it, is why National Review is updating their security plan even as we type.

Gonerill in 69 really catches the heart of the problem with the heroes-would-have-rushed-him argument.

In real life, with only one life to spend, when vastly outgunned and given no time to ponder, the damage-minimizing solution is pretty much always to flee.

In video games, of course, you keep trying until you come up with the right solution - and maybe one mind controls a number of units, so telepathic coordination seems realistic. Failure to attack the gunman was not merely an example of humans having feet of clay - it was an example of humans not being superhuman, not possessing the attributes of characters in video games.

To clarify one thought: In a situation like this, fleeing a gunman doesn't seem to be the result of a lack of ideal heroism, as (I think) ogged would have it. Fleeing is the practical and appropriate and *correct* response, by almost any reasonable standard, to such a situation.

"And even if hit, a .22 needs to find something important to do real damage -- your chances aren't bad."

I wish Derbyshire had rushed the gunman, too.

Burke got it exactly right in an earlier thread. Resolving to yourself to do what you can in such a situation is one thing; criticizing others for not being heroes is--well, very unheroic.

Reading the NBC story, all I can think is "that poor, stupid, damned son-of-a-bitch."

The whole argument is bullshit. Presumably, you make the best decision you can, given the information you have. In this case, that means you should run and hide. If you want to play hero, great--I genuinely wish you luck--but let's not kid ourselves: absent some training, you're play-acting and hoping you get lucky.

Probably not even that rational. More what particular form does your fight-or-flight reaction take in those few seconds your adrenaline-charged brain has to process what's going on.

I hope this experience does not trigger a wave of prejudice and persecution against those who are mentally ill. There is almost no statistically significant difference in crime rates between the mentally ill population versus the general population.

Forgive me an off-topic comment, but perhaps I can cast a little sunshine in a gloomy thread by reminding everyone that right now - right this very minute - Alberto Gonzales is having a really shitty night.

Woot!

Am I the only one who thinks the picture of him with the hammer has the exact opposite effect he was going for? I know they're saying he was inspired by a movie shot and all but it looks to me like something out of Zoolander. "Growl for the camera. Come on, you can do better than that. Whose my big, bad psychopath? You're a tiger! Growl for me!"

Maybe we can come to a compromise and the media can only release the pictures that make the killer look gay.

Yeah, I thought that one looked silly. In fact, the whole series is something we would have had a good laugh about if we'd found it on flickr six months ago.

93: We almost did, but I made an editorial decision to link to one photo instead of the whole bunch.

So great. Cho probably wasn't wearing flip flops.

In fact, what's striking about the video clips and the pictures is how much he's performing. Sometimes it looks like he's reading from a script. That's the kind of thing I would have guessed would be incompatible with true derangement, but it looks like I would have been wrong.

Not cool. Why the fuck did they air this stuff? This is like if they printed the Unabomber's manifesto after he was arrested.

Re the bad performing: it's consistent with the poetry and drama classes he was taking. He's clearly either reading from a page or reciting a prepared text in most of the clips.

96: One of the things that's really weird about psychosis (in my limited experience) is that some stuff in that brain can be working fine and other stuff just isn't. You see thinking that looks like the way your head works and you think hey, they can do it, and then you see some of the other stuff that's going on and you realize no, they just can't. Sometimes it looks like the tactics are working but the strategy's coming from some other dimension, and other times it's not even that organized. I can't even begin to imagine what it's like to be inside of a brain that's working like that.

Why the fuck did they air this stuff?

Supply and demand, yo. We all watched it.

Well, I'm going to watch it too, but I certainly don't approve of publicizing plenty of videos that I'd watch.

If he'd posted it on YouTube instead, I'd have no problem with it. But I bet anything that they'd have pulled it.

some stuff in that brain can be working fine and other stuff just isn't.

That was one of the most striking things I've ever seen and still makes me shudder when I think about it. The Prof took us behind about 57 locked doors at Creedmore in Queens, and we watched as a shrink interviewed some patients. They seemed perfectly normal until the conversation got around to their particular nuttiness and then moved rapidly into the twilight zone. That they were seriously demented was sad but not scary. That they didn't have flashing warning lights as standard equipment was.

I looked at the photos. I'm not going to watch the videos. I'm with Brock: I really, really, really want to know who took the pictures, assuming they weren't just done using a timer or something.

They were almost surely taken with a timer. I read that the video (which I think I prefer not to watch, but I don't like YouTube manifestos either) ends with him reaching forward to stop the camera.

The NBC president, interviewed by Chris Matthews, suggested the stills were harvested from video footage, but he didn't explain why he thought this.

Yeah, part of me is with apo on this one, but part of me is like, "Neighbor, please."

I dunno. Maybe the answer is to pass a federal law forcing all of us to make our own multimedia manifestos. That way, we can defend ourselves against the creepy manifestos of others.

... more than 50% of engineering majors are psychopaths.

Speaking as an engineering major with vast experience with engineering majors, I'd put that number at 85 +/- 3%.

Some of them think they're more than one person, for example.

. Maybe the answer is to pass a federal law forcing all of us to make our own multimedia manifestos.

First we rid our great nation of low flush toilets. Then we can deal with the vanity shit.

109: Screw vanity -- I'm trying to protect us all! The only answer to psychos armed to the teeth with creepy manifestos is for all of us to have them.

Of course, mine won't be creepy at all. But I bet ogged's would be in-frakkin-sane.

But I bet ogged's would be in-frakkin-sane.

Ummm, hellooo?

Women avoided him, and he kept threatening to beat people up...

Off to bed; I expect manifestos on my desk in the morning.

manifestos

Rhymes with "asbestos".

Some of them think they're more than one person, for example.

Rather than condemning me for the rather tasteless VT jokes I thought of putting here, people should be praising me for my restraint. Or at least forgiving me for linking to this.

Is this the spot for tasteless VT jokes? I don't know any, but that;s good to know, One to change the lightbulb and 32 to absorb the shrapnel.

For you science fiction readers: Michael Bishop's son Jamie [Christopher James Bishop] was one of the VT victims. He was a professor of German, age 35 at the time of his death. He is survived by his wife Stefanie Hofer and his parents, Michael and Jeri.

Psychopaths are charming, charismatic, promiscuous, and loquacious. If engineers were psychopaths, they'd earn more. And stuff would fall down a lot, but no one would ever get sacked for it.
*thinks a bit more* actually, if engineers were psychopaths they would be merciless despots terrorising the entire world, and only infighting among their union would save the human race from extinction. I'm very glad y'all are wrong. And that psychopaths become lawyers.