On Mon, 18 Feb 2008 13:49:44 -0300, nemesis wrote:

> Jim Henderson wrote:
>> On Sun, 17 Feb 2008 21:25:46 -0500, nemesis wrote:
>>> Someone, somewhere, would make a
>>> big noise out of it, make such horrid news spread.  Unless there are
>>> no survivors to tell the tale...
>> 
>> The reach was not as great in the past as it is now.
> 
> yes, I was ready to consider that argument:  the much wider news reach
> thanks to faster technology.  I think it's a valid one.

Good, we've found something to agree on.

> Just consider this, though:  if a well-known serial killer like Jack the
> Ripper, who slaughtered prostitutes, was so well known, wouldn't the
> slaughter of school students make for a much wider shock?  My point is
> that criminals shooting each other or serial killers reports are
> well-documented in news and fiction even in old times, while the
> possibly much more shocking news of students being shot were not.

Well, I don't know how long it took for the stories about Jack the Ripper 
to spread - do you?

Keep also in mind that JtR's targets were in a large city - more rural 
areas would have had much less coverage.  If Laura Ingals Wilder had shot 
up her schoolyard, we might well not have heard of it, partly because it 
was a rural area, and partly because small towns tended to not talk about 
serious things like this happening with outsiders.

> But I agree with you in that news were a lot less widespread then.  It
> may also be that only a few reports are memorable enough to make it
> through the ages, like Jack the Ripper or the Columbine massacre...

Yes, I think that's probably the case.  After all, before I mentioned the 
shooting in Wisconsin, had you even heard of it?  Or the one in Scotland?

Yet you know the names Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold - but not Barry 
Loukaitis.

> My gut feeling, though, is that we live in a far more cynical society
> and life is worth almost nothing.

Well, for some people, that's certainly the case.  But I think the 
majority (if not the overwhelming majority) does have a healthy respect 
and value for life.

The thing is, we - as a people - tend to overreact to things, especially 
here in the US.  One crazy guy fails to blow up a plane using a shoe bomb 
(which some have argued couldn't have worked regardless), and now 
everyone who boards a plane has to take their shoes off.

Jim

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