This from an article regarding the teenager who shot his school principal to death earlier today:
“He always used to kid around about bringing things to school and hurting kids,” she said at a gas station nearby where students and townspeople gathered.
A couple of conservative bloggers have thought it funny in the past to mock threaten a few with weapons. I'll not mention names. If you are regular cheddarsphere bloggers, you know who I am talking about.
This shooting is another reason why it is not funny.
4 Swings of the bat:
There's a BIG difference between humorous threats and real-live threats.
Apparently this kid was 'real-live' threatening.
Then again, typed words have no inflections.
The principal died trying to defend the school by disarming the perp; the custodian assisted in that quest. Both are heroes.
Regardless, it's a very sad day.
Dad29 -
Threats are threats. It doesn't sound like anyone took this kid seriously. Look what happened. Not knowing the entire situation, it sounds like others knew it may have been coming, but chose not to believe it. Hindsight is always 20/20, but it makes you wish any kid would have said something, like the kids in Green Bay did before tragedy could strike.
Having said that, I am in total agreement with you on your last two sentences. What a horrible day for that town. What a heroic act by a brave man.
I've come to the conclusion that threats are violence.
One of my colleagues makes threats regularly. Management says, don't worry, he has always done this and has never acted on any of it.
This means, unproductively, that everyone else has to figure out, individually, how they will handle working with him. And I am not convinced he won't just snap one day.
PZ and atari:
In the case of the school-shooter and the colleague, it seems that we have a drum-roll of threats. They were more or less continuous.
That may well be the line of demarcation. A 'once-in-a-while' threat (INFLECTION COUNTS) doesn't necessarily portend anything other than frustration.
But then, it's always useful to KNOW who you're dealing with.
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