Julie GoldbergJul 15, 2024
I am reminded that we never found out the motive of the murderer who massacred 58 people in Las Vegas in 2017. Six years afterward, there was a suggestion that he might have been angry at the casino, but they still don't know for sure and will never know. Only in fiction do murderers always have a clear idea of who they want dead and why. When I think about local murders, the "motive" is usually that someone was drunk, high, or psychotic, and angry at a friend or relative.
Show threadPirateRoJul 15, 2024

@Julie the problem is that the shooter is always killed, labeled a lone wolf and the whole thing shoved under a carpet. Who were his spheres of influence? Who paid to provide extremist views?

This event is not the action of a single person. The shooter is merely the gun at the top of a pyramid of supporting actions.

Show threadJulie GoldbergJul 15, 2024
@piratero When someone leaves behind a manifesto, a medical record, a school disciplinary file, a rap sheet, or a long online history of consuming or producing extremist content, then we can trace that line. We don’t yet know about this person. So far, all we can say for sure is that he had access to weapons of war that nobody should, and that is a money and ideology trail anybody can trace right through the Capitol and the Supreme Court.
Show threadPirateRo

@Julie it’s not enough. Intellectualizing a thing is not the thing itself, in all its inconsistency, double-dealing, miscommunications, misinterpretations and just plain ignorance.

I’m not saying we should put down these things to construct a model, but the model is useless without empirical testing with that person. I’m also not suggesting that such a model won’t be he,Paul, quite the reverse, in identifying others.

But we have a different type of learning with a live subject.

Jul 17, 2024 at 12:48amWeb