Three things I have to say, @bobknight33:
1. You're complaining about christianity being attacked. Ok, fine, I'll tell you something: I am tired of your religious beliefs invading my life like an middle eastern dictator a small, oily country. Oh, I have it good, I'm a straight, white middle-european man, I'm fine so far. Others are not. They're tired as well.
I can go on a meth-bender, marry one of the Kardashians in Vegas and annul the whole affair in less than a week. If I win the lottery, I can post on Craigslist and get myself a nice gold-digging whore who'll sign a certificate that makes us husband and wife if I'm willing to trade lackluster blowjobs for money. Best part, it ain 't prostitution if you're married, legally worldwide. Heck, I can even become an abusive piece of shit as long as I can beat her well enough so she won't complain to others.
Because marriage is sanctimonious.
If I was gay and would like to marry the guy of my dreams that I've been with for 20 years, that isn't possible. Because the book doesn't approve.
If my sister got raped, you people would force her to birth the child of her rapist. Her concerns don't matter, life is a holy gift from god. Care to explain to me the position of the catholic church (you know, those christians that make up the majority of christianity) on slavery during centuries slavery? How holy was life in all those european colonies back in the day with all these missionaries teaching the good book? What exactly was their statement as an organisation when millions or people were murdered during the third Reich?
All that silence but when it comes to abortion, you people show up with guns and show the value of this great gift by murdering doctors. Fuck my sisters concerns, right? It just rape, walk it off.
I'm well of, I could join the club as a full member anytime. As long as I'm not calling the cops on the pedophile priests and the self-loathing faggots can stand on their pulpits and tell little children they're broken. I could be among you.
But I have a conscience. I can't buy all that talk about love and forgiveness and ignore all that hatred and cruelty that is in the very basis of your beliefs, that wretched, old bible of yours.
I have to look that man in the mirror in the eyes.
The only way you can impose all that crap on me anymore if through the government. I believe your faith has as much place in there than Tom Cruise's. None.
The Prodigy said it best and I think the people who lived at the time the bible was written would agree: Invaders must die.
Your religion invades my rights as a human being.

2. Did he rise?
Nope, little, brown Jewish got killed. End of facts, begin of story. I don't trust the testimony of men (and I said this before) who consider a walkman witchcraft. People at that time could be convinced that they farted because they swallowed an angry spirit that wants to escape.
You book did a terrible job of explaining how the world came to be (we're golems that had so much incest that they inbred mankind), makes up the worst disastermovies (everything turns to Waterworld but we have a boat with a pair of every animal in existence [imagine all those different kinds of ants alone] and then incest till population is back up) and turns mushroomtrips/mental illness in supposedly accurate future predictions (you know it's the end of the world because none of the riders is called "Incest").
The only reason people buy into the mythology and the extended universe (where's that bible chapter about Satan ruling the Sarlac Pit and Santa being canon again? ) is because for centuries children were taught it at a young age. And then you told them not to question it as heretics get the stake. Ashes yes but not the quick Buffy way.
Don't get me wrong, I like that Jesus fellow and I'm willing to believe his basic message but let's be honest. If J.K. Rowling was born 2000 years earlier, we'd pray to Harry Potter and wear lightning shaped jewelery around our neck. You guys got big because the Roman empire made you relevant. That's it.

3. What's up with '53'? Is that the christian answer to '42'?

This kind of attitude is depressing. It's none of your business what someone does in their spare time when no one else is affected by it. There are functioning alcoholics turning up for work pissed, flying planes, driving buses, teaching children. But no, let's go after the guy who sits in his bedroom playing music with a joint. Let's prevent him from having a life, even if he is self medicating a mental illness. It serves him right - if he's got an illness, he shouldn't be using naturally occurring medicine like our ancestors have for thousands upon thousands of years, no! He should be paying hundreds of pounds to a big pharma company for a pill that they invented a few years ago.

The premise behind drugs testing people is based on many things i disagree with:
1) the spectacular failure of the war of drugs - not only has drug use increased in the timeframe, but it has ruined probably millions of lives, needlessly turning ordinary, hard working people into criminals for no good reason other than "we like this plant, but we don't like this plant, and now neither may you"
2) the origin of the war on drugs - which iirc from a well sourced and produced video on here recently was instigated by a vindictive racist who wanted to go criminalise things that were seen as "black people" pastimes
3) the bias of the war on drugs - where drugs associated with the poor and underprivileged are relentlessly pursued to the detriment of functioning happy families across the world, but drugs associated with rich white folk such as those boardroom jockeys who snort coke in the office bathroom, nah, give them an easy time
4) the american prison business - which demands a steady supply of low cost, low maintenance, low rights workers who have no choice in the matter
5) the spreading of disinformation through formal education/popular media, and lack of actual knowledge or experience of drugs - which has led to a generation of people who now firmly believe that the moment you inhale a particle of THC (or "inject 1 marijuana" to the uninitiated), your brain turns into a fried egg, and you immediately begin stealing, cheating, and peddling dangerous items to children

Some of the brightest and best humans were influenced and inspired by drugs. If i wrote a list of people that i had the greatest respect for and who i considered to have made a positive influence on the world, half of them would almost certainly be drugs users; and i mean scientists, writers and artists. Your philosophy is a detriment to society, but thankfully as the decades pass, there are less and less with that philosophy. I loathe being blunt, but there is nothing worse than someone who feels the need to dictate to others what they should and shouldn't do on the basis of what they personally do or don't approve of.

We might get about 90 years on this planet with a bit of luck - why the hell do the minority spend so much time trying to dictate to the majority what they do with that time? And why do the majority let them? What sort of control fetish is it that inclines people to want to do that?

This guy's life has been fucking ruined by your adopted philosophy towards drugs, and you offer to help him as long as he bends to your will? How magnanimous of you to stoop to gutter level to help a mere drug-addled cretin... I think he'd tell you to stick your job, he's overqualified to work under you.

I am not 'calling' it anything. By legal definition some of his crimes are considered violent crimes and he would have been charged/will be charged as such when he appears before a court.

Robbing a store with a finger in your pocket is the same as robbing it with a gun or piece of metal per the eyes of the law.

Setting fire to an OCCUPIED structure is a violent crime. Committing Arson even on an empty structure can be considered a violent crime depending on who could be hurt if the fire spreads or explosions occur from the contents of the building.

Burglary (also called breaking and entering and sometimes housebreaking) is a crime, the essence of which is illegal entry into a building for the purposes of committing an offence. Usually that offence will be theft, but most jurisdictions specify others which fall within the ambit of burglary. Trespassing is typically entering a section of land that has been marked.

Motor vehicle theft (sometimes referred to as grand theft auto by the media and police departments in the US) is the criminal act of stealing or attempting to steal a car. This can happen in many ways, but they all fall under this description.

As far as the gun theft, still falls under the definition of burglary. He stole a weapon and tussled with the store employees to escape. I personally would call it a violent crime, but I don't know for sure if it legally is considered one or if it would be relegated more to shoplifting.

Yeah, I am taking the word of the police that he pointed the gun at them. Maybe I shouldn't because out of the thousands of arrests and incidents that happen daily across the country, we have a few videos that show spurious methods used by a few officers. I mean, I get that right now the public trust in officers is at an all time low for good reason, but given the sheer number of things that this guy already did that day, I have to assume that they might not be lying in this case.

As far as the officer, like I said, maybe he overreacted. But I would rather we risk the death of a clearly severely mentally ill person than read about the 11 year old he shot because he was crazy and had a gun.

In the end, you have the right to see and feel about the incident any way you see fit. You don't have to agree with a single thing I say. But I posted what I posted because I felt that just the video alone is not a clear picture of what was going on in this situation. I merely shared some of the facts that were printed by a major media outlet so that people could have the additional information to make up their minds about the video.

All the information I referred to or copied was from the link to the CNN article in the link the sifter provided above.

Crimes in which violence is the means to an end, such as robbery, are violent crimes. Violent crimes may, or may not, be committed with weapons. He robbed a store, committed arson on an occupied structure, committed breaking and entering upon a private home, stole the car at said home which is GTA, then committed another robbery at the walmart when he took the gun.

CNN stated that the person was also accused of pointing the rifle at the police, firing it in the air, and then later pointing it at himself. The man clearly has some mental issues, but he was a threat to society in the condition he was in. His rights do not trump the rights of his fellow citizens to be protected from his mental illness.

There are lots of ways that this could have been handled differently, but there are also lots of ways this could have went worse. We could be discussing why the police didn't do more before this guy shot an innocent bystander.

From the interview that I saw on CNN of the police chief, lethal force had been authorized if needed. I think this officer saw an opportunity and took it, perhaps over zealously, to end the situation without harm to innocents.

Your video, Fox News Can't Discuss Mental Illness Because They Create It, has made it into the Top 15 New Videos listing. Congratulations on your achievement. For your contribution you have been awarded 1 Power Point.

This achievement has earned you your "Pop Star" Level 52 Badge!

i am not surprised we pretty much agree.

you should always be careful with any substance and to be informed is the first step.
was i careful at 15 with double barrel purple mescaline?---->nope.i was 15.

but i think the argument is getting caught up in distinctions,which is common.
when i speak of psychedelics,i am talking about:LSD,shrooms,mescaline.
and while exstacy is considered a psychedelic,and it IS a psychedelic (and awesome btw),i also consider that drug to be more a "club" drug,a designer drug,and yes...it can be fatal because often it is NOT mdma/mda you're are taking but a cocktail of bullshit with a few experimental chemistry molecules thrown in...so your cautionary tale is not exactly unfounded..but i have never seen shagen even suggest mdma/mda but almost exclusively:DMT.

now,i am fairly cautious in suggesting DMT to the uninitiated due to the fact of its potency (even in small amounts).there is no small build up with DMT,it goes from first gear to 15th in 2.2 seconds,and for a newcomer that can easily overwhelm and frighten.

for psychedelics to produce a positive and healthy response there first has to be interest in trying psychedelics out.the worst thing you could EVER do is "hey man,i just filled your beer with shroom tea" (you would notice though,that shit tastes like concentrated ass).

the person should also be in the right frame of mind and be in a place and with people they feel comfortable with and trust (very important the first time).knowing the dosage is important but not as important as you would think,as long as you take things slow and with patient care..things will sort out nicely.

as for death and permanent brain damage.i am not familiar with any cases except for the movie they showed us in the 7th grade with helen hunt thinking she could fly,because she took acid.i know psychedelics can affect a personality permanently (usually for the better) but nothing life threatening.i know too high a dosage on a novice mind can cause a "bad" trip and leave an unpleasant memory of the experience.there have been cases of latent mental illnesses manifesting due to the psychedelics,but it didnt CAUSE the mental illness.

from my own personal experience and what i have read,psychedelics are pretty safe.they are not a toy.they are an extremely powerful psychoactive compound that should always be treated with respect and to ignore that can have consequences.

but i dont think death and permanent brain damage are on that list.

unless you decided to do something stupid while tripping,but that is evolution,not psychedelics.

i could always come to california and we could drink shroom kool-aid.hang out on the moutain-side and watch the sunset and by the time we are watching the sunrise we will have become blood brothers and watched the universe expand in glorious birth pangs and then collapse upon itself in its death throes.talked to stars and danced with super novas.find ourselves in a meadow,thinking we walked half the state only to realize we are a 1/4 mile from your back porch.

i promise good times my friend.good times indeed.

No, if you want maximum impact, pre-screen for mental illness. That way we take out all of the bottom feeders. If they can't afford medication they'll become criminals anyway. Then we just house them in cells. Food and shelter and money into the criminal justice system. Seems like a fairly well organized machine. I could write a program that simulates it.

Hey kceaton1,

I'm sorry to hear about the narcolepsy and sleep paralysis. I remember watching a video someone put out recently (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PuvXpv0yDM) that sort of explained what it is like and it didn't seem like very much fun. I can't really imagine what you're going through. I have a friend who has narcolepsy but it must be a mild version because it seems like she kind of winds up to it and comes out of it pretty easy.

In regards to your question, I appreciate you not writing off my response as one thing or another. In regards to supernatural experiences, I can see why you have a lot of skepticism as well. You have experienced things on the order of what you've heard other people call supernatural experiences, but you have a natural explanation for them.

Having a supernatural experience can be hard to quantify, and usually when God is revealing something to you, it goes beyond sense impressions. You could perhaps write some of them off as one thing or another but three experiences in particular stand out to me as being undeniable. They aren't necessary what led me to Christ but they really defy any kind of naturalistic explanation.

The first was from before I was a Christian, when I was into the new age. At the time I was exploring a lot of eastern spiritual practices. There is one in particular, which I wont go into detail about, that for a few minutes allowed me to see with my eyes closed. When I was in the shower one day I closed my eyes to rinse my hair and when I did I was utterly shocked and amazed to be looking right at my feet and the water falling down upon them. It was real time and the only difference from normal vision was it had kind of an energetic haze over everything, kind of matrix looking. It was otherworldly but still completely in sync with my normal vision when I opened my eyes.

I wasn't hallucinating because I was able to test it in real time by opening and closing my eyes and looking at various things. It was all completely consistent and completely real. I could see what was going on to minute detail with my eyes closed and when I opened them everything matched perfectly, and vice versa. I wasn't dreaming because I immediately got out of the shower and told my then significant other who would vouch for that happening. It didn't last long but I did experience it and there isn't a naturalistic explanation.

The second thing that happened to me is that is undeniable is that I was physically healed by a Christian praying over me. My left leg used to be shorter than my right leg by a quarter inch. I know this because I measured it a few times and it caused me to walk somewhat unevenly. The man prayed for someone else who had the same problem except worse, and I saw their leg grow out and even up with the other. When I saw that I asked to be prayed for and the same thing happened to me. I know it did because I measured my legs and they are exactly the same length. I also had to learn how to walk correctly after this happened. Again, no naturalistic explanation.

The third thing happened at my baptism. I knew I needed to get baptized, although at the time I didn't really understand what it was all about. When I got baptized, it completely changed me. The easiest way to described it is, when I went into the water I was one person, and when I came back up I was a different person. Different in this sense, that I was cleansed on the inside. Emotionally and spiritually, it was like a thick black sludge had been removed from the walls of my heart. An emotional weight had been lifted, depression and anger and sadness disappeared; it was replaced with an incredible lightness, with true peace and joy. This wasn't superficial; I was utterly changed. I was a different and better (healed)person, and on top of that I could sense the tangible presence of the Holy Spirit, from that moment on until now.

People have given me different explanations; hallucinations, psychotic break, etc. I've have a lot of experience with people who have mental illness; the things that happen to them aren't positive, they're negative. When they think they have entered Nirvana, their behavior is completely off and often self-destructive. Delusional psychosis doesn't heal, it hurts. One way or another, the whole thing is going to unravel because it isn't real. What has happened to me is very real and I experience Gods love, care and guidance every day of my life. The Lord is good, and He is faithful; He cares even about the little things of my life.

I am a Christian not simply because I have seen miracles, it is because I believe the gospel. I know I am a sinner and that I need a Savior. I know that Savior is the Lord Jesus Christ, who died for my sins and was raised to life on the third day. The Lord has made that clear to me and I don't have any trouble agreeing with Him. He gave it all for me; why should I do any less? Before I knew the Lord I was resigned to a meaningless death. Today, I have a living hope. But I didn't come to be a Christian because I am afraid of death. I came to be a Christian because God revealed Himself to me, that He created me for a reason, and that my true fulfillment and purpose can only be found in Him. Since I have given my life to Jesus Christ, I have found that to be completely true, in ways I could never have imagined. My life affirms the truth of this scripture:

Ephesians 3:20 Now to Him who is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us,
Ephesians 3:21 to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, forever. Amen.

Most habitually homeless are mentally ill...literally...it is sad. I am glad he helped people out.

Stupid so powerful and detrimental, it's like a form of mental illness.

To be fair about being fair there are a lot of assumptions in your post. One they did not arrest him on the spot. That leaves a little dignity for the World War 2 veteran. Although the State picking it up at all is a douche move. Two, he probably will not go to jail at all. They say "Up to 60 days" which really means "We just like to give round numbers that won't ever fucking happen because it's sensational."

You could in theory be sentenced to a year in county time for trespassing, but that will not happen the first 40 times or so. (I have seen people sentenced to that much time. And by people I mean "person".)

Off that subject, if law officers obsessed over every immoral law out there then in no world system would there be any law. The laws against crack rock? Extremely, blatantly racist. Pot laws? I think a bit immoral. Laws against effective protest measures, gay marriage, fuck, even public nudity. All these laws are someone else's bullshit of how things ought to be.

The next problem is that of cause and effect. We have banned child molesters from most of the city areas in an attempt to get them away from "our" children. The side effect is that we really haven't solved the issue. The chronically homeless (Not to be confused with the majority of homeless who actually get out of being homeless) are mentally ill and or on drugs. Although not particularly dangerous or volatile, this is Florida, and even our homeless are more dangerous than other parts of the county.

Lastly, there are no moral jobs out there. If you work for a hospital, business, restaurant, power company, phone company, agricultural etc you are working for an evil, evil place. This is America--money keeps us running. And the homeless have no money.

Yep. Assassination is what I call that. There's absolutely no way any SANE person can excuse that, the police had every opportunity to safely use non lethal force, but chose to use only lethal force, enough lethal force to kill about 75 people from what I heard, maybe more than that.
This was 2012. Any word on what's happened since then? Was this Albuquerque? (I'm guessing based on his football uniform, and the fact that they have a history of killing the mentally ill)

I respect anyone's choice to do or not do anything they choose. I thought the same way about it until I started to wonder if I wanted to go to my grave not knowing what it felt like out of some stubborn desire to win an imaginary "drug free" sticker at the moment of my death.

I saw some people who smoked it and were a) not addicted or changed by the act and b) functioned excellently and contributed greatly to society (in the form of music and literature and art). So I tried it, and I'd say it taught me a way to cope with my brain and how it works, so I can fight long term depression.

I'm sorry that he didn't stress that there are absolutely no causal links established either between psychosis or education. I still strongly believe that there will be a link between psychosis or mental illness and the willingness or desire to try it - which in turn would give them medicinal relief and in effect they end up unwittingly self medicating. We know it has medicinal qualities as did our ancestors. I think that the link between poverty and social elements greatly affect the uptake rate, having grown up both in council estate (very poor) areas and middle class areas between parents I can vouch for that disparity personally.

I think it's an obvious logical conclusion, and all I need is evidence to disprove it. Until then I certainly will not apologise for using something that has been of the earth for millions of years over something mixed and concocted by pharmaceutical companies that have documented side effects, overdose risk, and actual addiction.

Yes it's a coincidence. That's the most likely outcome from trying to draw conclusions from the position of a single data point. I'm not sure if you think that the culture of a Spanish speaking Caribbean colony a thousand miles from the mainland is representative of the US as a whole, but that seems a strange position to take.

In any event, you have shifted the discussion from spree killers to killers in general. The video here is about a guy who might have stopped a spree killer (but almost certainly didn't), and did shoot a mentally ill person. You raise European comparisons, so let's do that. Let's look at Europe's recent spree killers (from wiki)
Borel, Eric, 1995, legal weapons stolen from family
Leibacher, Friedrich Heinz, 2001, legal weapons
Bogdanovič, Ljubiša, 2013, legal I believe
Izquierdo, 1990, legal I think
Radosavljević, Nikola, 2007, legal
Zavistonovičius, Leonardas, 1998, legal
Durn, Richard, 2002, legal
Harman, Ľubomír, 2010, legal
There's the top 8 by deaths (excl. the UK ones already mentioned). All using legally held weapons. There may be a pattern emerging here...

@harlequinn, you do realise that NZ actually has quite sensible gun laws? You can own semi-auto rifles and so on but to do so you need a firearms licence. This includes not only a police check, but the cops will actually come to your house and check that you have adequate storage provisions for your guns. On top of that

You will have difficulty being deemed 'fit and proper' to possess or use firearms if you have:

- a history of violence
- repeated involvement with drugs
- been irresponsible with alcohol
- a personal or social relationship with people deemed to be unsuitable to be given access to firearms
- indicated an intent to use a firearm for self-defence.

To me those are perfectly reasonable and sensible restrictions.

@scheherazade, ah yes, the libertarian argument. I want a gun and fuck everyone else.

Kids getting shot at school? Fuck 'em, not my problem.
Random nutjob mows down a bunch of people in California? Fuck 'em, not my problem.

The fact is that guns do cause harm. The "people kill people" argument is beyond infantile. Of course, people kill people.... with a gun. It's a lot harder to go on a mass killing spree armed with a stick.

Here are the indisputable facts:
- There are some sick people out there. Some are just fucked up, some are in need of help.
- Sometimes these people snap.
- Sometimes when they do, they get a gun and kill a bunch of other people.
- If they didn't have a gun, the harm would be less.
I'm assuming no-one disputes those facts.

Now there are two solutions to this:
- Pro-gun advocates take the position that citizens need guns to defend themselves from this kind of situation. They often argue that instead of taking guns away from everyone, we should focus on either helping the mentally unbalanced or stopping them by shooting them.
- Gun control advocates take the position that if the shooter didn't have access to a gun in the first place, then maybe the whole mess would be avoided or at the very least minimised.

To me, it's a simple matter of practicalities. Option 1 is simply not working. We're decades (possibly centuries) away from completely understanding mental illness, that's if we achieve that at all. Meanwhile, crazy/insane/evil people are still going on shooting rampages.
And stopping them after the fact? That's pretty cold comfort to the people that have already been killed.

I am genuinely perplexed as to how people don't understand this.
Gun control works. In every other developed country in the world, there are reasonable and sensible laws restricting firearm ownership, and there is nothing like the kind of insane shootings we see on a regular basis in the US.

No-one is arguing that all guns should be taken away. No-one is saying you can't hunt or target shoot or even defend your home if necessary (although again, in the civilised world, most of us have no need for that).

But jesus, maybe you don't need an AR-15 with a massive clip. And is it that unreasonable to check to see if someone is mental or criminal before selling them a gun?

Apparently, in the US, it is.