tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11752889.post4970279493498320682..comments2023-11-02T11:26:48.409-04:00Comments on Seminole Heights: Which Way OutDavid Scott Bangharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02535473319051118500noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11752889.post-7177480221387504992007-04-18T19:04:00.000-04:002007-04-18T19:04:00.000-04:00When I lived in Austin, my office was spitting dis...When I lived in Austin, my office was spitting distance from the base of the University of Texas clock tower, from which Charles Whitman killed 15 people and wounded 31 others in 1966. Prior to Monday, he held the dubiious record of the highest body count in a mass killing. <BR/>I used to contemplate this from time to time while on a smoke break, looking up at the tower. He began by stabbing his mother and his wife, and then climbed the tower with a footlocker full of ammunition and a high powered rifle.<BR/>He was a 1960's all American guy, boy scout, marine, highly trained marksman. Somewhere, somehow, something snapped. Unconfirmed information says that he might have had a brain tumor that might have caused this. I dunno.<BR/>A bit more accurately, I read an essay by Harry Crews several years ago. (Crews was once the University of Florida's redneck laureate) In it, he describes speaking at UT, with his handlers acting along the lines of "let's get Crews drunk and watch the train wreck". <BR/>Later that night he found himself drunk and alone at the base of the tower, wondering what drives a person to make that 27 story climb with a heavy load of ammunition. Whitman had time to stop and reflect, but he didn't change course. <BR/>Crews realized that at some point, every person faces a figurative climb up that tower, in some way shape or form. That desperate time in one's life when nothing matters and capable of anything. For most, that moment passes and reflection persuades them to reconsider their course.<BR/>In short, that mass murderer is alive in each and every one of us. It's whether or not rationality and clarity reign that changes the outcome. As Tommy said above, about all that you can really do is keep living life and hope for the best.Mal Carnehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12132487389566068539noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11752889.post-27998866702232345432007-04-17T23:19:00.000-04:002007-04-17T23:19:00.000-04:00First off, I applaud you working for the DCF. I wa...First off, I applaud you working for the DCF. I was a foster parent in the Florida Panhandle several years ago and I was very impressed with the overworked and underpaid employees that assisted us. Hopefully I'll be a foster parent once again in a few weeks.<BR/><BR/>I have dealt with security and counter/anti-terrorism issues for nearly ten years. When speaking to clients traveling in other countries I've always recommended that they play the "what-if game". Believe it or not, there are people that think it is silly to think about what to do "if"..... Its not a bad idea to have a plan even if its not "offical". My team members would always joke about what we would do "if" when we worked in the Middle East and it worked out for us on a couple occasions. <BR/><BR/>The most overlooked parts to a security plan is communication. Granted everyone has cell phones to call 911. But if someone sees someone with a weapon in your building, how do you alert everyone else? A duress word that you would not use in normal conversation works better than having to explain yourself. Especially if you have to use it front of the assailant before he or she commits the act. Or you could scream it at the top of your lungs, situation always dictates. Anyways, if you ever run into me I full of tons of silly security tips. Its just to bad I don't follow all of my advice. <BR/><BR/>Whenever I run across people that I would suspect of commiting mass killing (I think we've all worked with that guy) I do two things: Keep my distance from that person and be nice to that person when I have to interact with that individual. Of course you can't always avoid people and you can't make everyone happy. So I go with option three, "keep living life and hope for the best."Tommy McNeeleyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06776272802470685955noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11752889.post-26190931616927431812007-04-17T23:12:00.000-04:002007-04-17T23:12:00.000-04:00It's a very tough question, and I don't know if th...It's a very tough question, and I don't know if there is an answer. How do we balance our instincts to weigh the rights of the individual so heavily even when many of the signs indicate a strong probability for future violence. With so many arguments about possible causative factors(violence on tv or in video games, fragmenting of the traditional family, hormones and other food additives, exposure to pollution, you name it) there's no real humane and viable solution. There just are people that have the capacity for such violence within them, whatever the roots. Should that propensity be suspected, what do we do with them? How humane is it to lock them up in a loony bin for the remainder of their lives? How humane would it be to remove a part of their brain, or pharmacologically lobotomize them and release them back into society? I'll admit that a person that requires medication to suppress the demons scares the crap out of me, and a person that has demonstrated the capacity for violence on another human being has already crossed a line that can never be "uncrossed." But, I honestly think it is just a price we pay for living in a relatively free society. For myself I don't find incidents like this any more shocking than the violence humans demonstrate every day in the world, except that it's perhaps closer to home. Adults and youths alike commit atrocities against people worldwide from genocide in eastern Europe and Africa, and the Pacific Rim to terrorist acts in the Middle East and Israel. <BR/>So, what can we do? Like you mentioned, we can have a plan, look around, think about what we do, where you go, and try to live our lives to the fullest every day. We can reach out to someone that might need a hand, offer a kind word, a smile or a Thank you, empathize with those who are suffering, make the world a better place in our own unique ways. Plus, we might all seek some comfort in the fact that statistically we're all much more likely to die from some natural cause later in life.IFlyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12813629254366578821noreply@blogger.com