"It didn't mention nobody who lives in Clark County, didn't mention (George Rogers Clark High School), didn't mention no principal or cops, nothing,"
said Poole. "Half the people at high school know me. They know I'm not that stupid, that crazy."
Even so, police say the nature of the story makes it a felony. "Anytime you make any threat or possess matter involving a school or function it's a felony in the state of Kentucky," said Winchester Police detective Steven Caudill.
Joss Whedon better stay out of Kentucky, considering that 99% of his work involves violence at a highschool.
My concern is more for the fact and reason the law got involved in this.
I swear, what kind of backwards grandparents would read a fictional story about zombies and turn it into the police, without even asking the kid what it was and why it was made. I'm so glad that kid has a family that loves him so much that they'd rather assume he was a Columbine Nutcase than a horror movie fan >.>
Dark Crow wrote:Hey, did the US Bill of Rights take a holiday or something? I can vaguely remember there being a right to free speech, religion and press.
Oh, that doesn't apply if you're under 18. Nor has it applied to anyone else since the unconstitutional passing of the Patriot Act.
If I recall Calvin pretended he was flying an F14 and bombed the shit out of elementary school. Watterson said (in the 10th Anniversary book) that he got tons of letters from crazed parents about putting ideas in their childrens heads or something. His comment was "some people were never kids" or something to that effect.
As for this topic, the freedom of speech has always had limits. Here are some fun ones: you can't yell "FIRE" in a crowded place. you can't tell people how to construct nuclear weapons. you can't talk about classified information.
While I don't agree that this kid should be prosecuted, the Zombie school thing should have raised a warning flag for the kid's guardians, counselars and whomever to talk to the kid. The kids at Columbine did all sorts of weird shit like this before they shot up the place and nobody said a word, if they had, Michael Moore wouldn't have had to blame Charlton Heston for it. This is just a case of going to far, though some action should have been taken.
It's all funny until some punks come around and shoot your friends right in front of you with some semi-auto Mac-10s.
Seriously, my own dad sometimes makes a mention about my own obsession about firearms and while it is boring and a drag (*snicker*), I'm also grateful for it. Some people don't take anything seriously and then people die.
If I recall correctly, those kids had guns in their <i>bedrooms</i>. There's a big difference between writing a story about zombies and owning semi-automatics.
Weren't those weapons bought by some girl they knew, and then she later got charged as an accomplice? I didn't follow Columbine that closely so pardon if my memory of the whole thing is a little off.
The difference is a few hundred bucks and the time necessary for a background check, and in some cases not even that. And it's not like it was common knowledge that these kids had weapons. Seriously what do you do? Oh you don't have any guns? Okay, then feel free to whatever the fuck you want, because ONLY PEOPLE THAT OWN FIREARMS AT THE PRESENT WILL COMMIT CRIMES IN THE FUTURE.
Oh and specifying they are semi-automatics is irrelevant (I know I did, but it was to say that they weren't "assault weapons," that they were legal) because most handguns are semi-automatic, generally only revolvers aren't and there is at least one model that is. I forget what it's called but the revolver Vash uses in Trigun is based on it.
The point is that the kid's guardians should have talked to him about it. If the guardian was doing his/her job from day one, the talk wouldn't have been very long. Just little bits of reinforcement now and again aren't going to kill the God damn kid and it will be much better then just ignoring the little things until they turn into big things. I already said I think arresting him was bullshit.
True enough. Hell, when I started to get seriously into gaming, my parents and I established the difference between reality and fantasy (note: this was a long time ago). It's been cool ever since. Hell, my dad thinks GTA is a riot.
chriscaffee wrote:And it's not like it was common knowledge that these kids had weapons. Seriously what do you do? Oh you don't have any guns? Okay, then feel free to whatever the fuck you want, because ONLY PEOPLE THAT OWN FIREARMS AT THE PRESENT WILL COMMIT CRIMES IN THE FUTURE.
Oh snap, guess I'm gonna do something illegal in the future, then.
My point was that children had guns in their bedroom, and their parents didn't know about it, and that writing a story and having a gun are two very different threats.
See here is the issue though. If no one knew that the Columbine kids had these guns, then how do you know that the guy that wrote Zombie fiction didn't have guns either? You aren't going to know unless you respond to the kid and take responsibility has a parent. There isn't anything wrong with what the kid did, but that doesn't mean a parental unit shouldn't be making sure.
Parents would have to be mind-numbingly incompetent to not know if their kid has guns. The Columbine kids parents took them hunting and crap at an early age if I recall. So they probably knew they had at least access to firearms.
I used to draw comic book style stories about war. Since that mystical "internet" wasn't accessible all I had to go on were library books, but I did quite a lot of research and got to know weapons and stuff somewhat well, and drew all that stuff in some story that had mainly to do with blowing stuff up and lots and lots of people dying. I even used red pencil and drew in (quite gratuitous amounts of) blood/gore. Then, I showed them to my parents. Later, nobody talked to me about it and I never got an urge to kill somebody.
There is a difference between correlation and causation, but in a world of such irresponsible parenting, I don't think we should be nitpicking between the two.
chriscaffee wrote:There is a difference between correlation and causation, but in a world of such irresponsible parenting, I don't think we should be nitpicking between the two.
