Likely not.

Wait.
You're saying there's video of him being chased from his gun toting friends by one guy with a pistol? For blocks? And none of his friends helped him at all? That might change my mind completely....but only if they essentially dragged him away, not if he followed along arguing, and if they physically forced him away from his friends, why didn't his friends try to help?

Again, I'll need some evidence of the pepper spray to believe it, because the videos of him running he wasn't acting like a person who had been pepper sprayed, not that it would excuse killing someone else, and I'm assuming the spray came after the first homicide.

(Edit: if the pepper spraying happened, and happened before he shot, then he has zero excuses for any of them. He couldn't see, so had no idea what was happening around him, who threw what, what was thrown, or who he was shooting. You can't see after being pepper sprayed. That makes every shot fired attempted murder of any random person in the area, not self defense. To be self defense, you must know who and what you're defending yourself from. If he was sprayed, he couldn't possibly know, nor could he properly aim.)

A plastic bag mistaken for a Molotov? Not by any American kid, all boys over 7 know what a Molotov looks like from movies and video games, they don't resemble empty plastic bags.

I think you're being biased. I may be too. I'm not excusing any threatening acts by protesters before he killed one, but do excuse any acts committed trying to apprehend him afterwards. (Edit: anything they did at that point would be real self defense, not just in their own minds.)

I can't find any way to excuse him, from going armed looking for trouble to leaving his group where he felt safe to mistaking a harmless object for a deadly one and killing someone out of fear to running away armed to shooting at his pursuers to not reporting it, every act indicates intentional murder and an attempt to escape. He might have had a reason, he may have even feared for his life, but he had no real reason, put himself in the situation that scared him, and opened fire for no GOOD reason.
Children often do things for bad reasons, that's one reason they shouldn't be let loose with firearms unaccompanied, especially not in high stress events like this.
It's not that he had no reason, it's that his reasoning was flawed on all points. He had no legitimate reason, and no legitimate excuse.

Btw, in case you don't recall, I'm not anti gun at all. I am anti armed groups traveling the country intent on killing unarmed people they disagree with, even if those people are being mean and scary, even if they're stealing. If they're committing arson, well maybe, that can be mass murder.

If you find a still live version of him being chased by armed protesters away from his friends, or threatened, I would be interested in seeing them. I find it impossible to envision. It's not that I'm not open to new info, it's only that I've seen none that excuse his killings.

(Edit: I'm looking at it like this....If a 17 year old kid wants to do extreme mountain climbing with little to no training, gets on the mountain and gets panicked and, thinking it will make him safer to have two ropes disconnects his partner's harness and they die, he had a reason, but not a legitimate reason, and not an excuse. This kid wanted to do extreme policing totally untrained, he panicked, people died because of his panicked actions. It's really that simple to me.)

Tags for this video have been changed from 'CBS, Alex Honnold, Free Solo, Guts, Brave, mountain climbing, Incredible' to 'CBS, Alex Honnold, Free Solo, Guts, Brave, mountain climbing, Incredible, 60 minutes' - edited by eric3579

>> ^ghark:

>> ^A10anis:
I'm sick to death of the government (UK) pretending to care about the health of smokers. Cigarettes are now hidden from view (pointless and frustrating for staff), and the aim is to have plain packaging (which will simply mean people can buy the cheapest brand without other people knowing). These silly measures do NOT stop people smoking, or starting to smoke. If the government weren't so hypocritical they would either ban smoking, or make them £200 a packet. Of course they won't, because the tax they would lose would be unnaceptable. Why don't they f off and go campaign against others who take part in, possibly, fatal activities. They could start with ski-ing, abseiling, mountain climbing, or simply getting out of bed in the morning. We smokers know, and yes, stupidly, accept the risks, so PLEASE get off our backs.

Smoking harms others, smoking also costs the public billions of dollars because of CVD, lung cancer etc. healthcare, so I'd like to hope that they won't. Smoking simply isn't an issue that can be left alone. Australia just in the past few weeks successfully defended themselves against a lawsuit by big tobacco for the new plain packaging rules, we'll see what effects the rules have in time I guess.
Most of those activities you mentioned consist of some form of pretty strenuous exercise, which is beneficial to the health of the individual - so while there may be public costs associated with each of the activities, there are also many benefits, and little to no risk to others.

You TOTALLY missed the point. And I have neither the time, nor the inclination, to explain it to you..

>> ^A10anis:

I'm sick to death of the government (UK) pretending to care about the health of smokers. Cigarettes are now hidden from view (pointless and frustrating for staff), and the aim is to have plain packaging (which will simply mean people can buy the cheapest brand without other people knowing). These silly measures do NOT stop people smoking, or starting to smoke. If the government weren't so hypocritical they would either ban smoking, or make them £200 a packet. Of course they won't, because the tax they would lose would be unnaceptable. Why don't they f off and go campaign against others who take part in, possibly, fatal activities. They could start with ski-ing, abseiling, mountain climbing, or simply getting out of bed in the morning. We smokers know, and yes, stupidly, accept the risks, so PLEASE get off our backs.


Smoking harms others, smoking also costs the public billions of dollars because of CVD, lung cancer etc. healthcare, so I'd like to hope that they won't. Smoking simply isn't an issue that can be left alone. Australia just in the past few weeks successfully defended themselves against a lawsuit by big tobacco for the new plain packaging rules, we'll see what effects the rules have in time I guess.

Most of those activities you mentioned consist of some form of pretty strenuous exercise, which is beneficial to the health of the individual - so while there may be public costs associated with each of the activities, there are also many benefits, and little to no risk to others.

I couldn't have put it better myself, WELL SAID dude. I can't promote a comment, so you'll just have to settle for an ^upvote^
In reply to this comment by A10anis:
I'm sick to death of the government (UK) pretending to care about the health of smokers. Cigarettes are now hidden from view (pointless and frustrating for staff), and the aim is to have plain packaging (which will simply mean people can buy the cheapest brand without other people knowing). These silly measures do NOT stop people smoking, or starting to smoke. If the government weren't so hypocritical they would either ban smoking, or make them £200 a packet. Of course they won't, because the tax they would lose would be unnaceptable. Why don't they f*** off and go campaign against others who take part in, possibly, fatal activities. They could start with ski-ing, abseiling, mountain climbing, or simply getting out of bed in the morning. We smokers know, and yes, stupidly, accept the risks, so PLEASE get off our backs.

I'm sick to death of the government (UK) pretending to care about the health of smokers. Cigarettes are now hidden from view (pointless and frustrating for staff), and the aim is to have plain packaging (which will simply mean people can buy the cheapest brand without other people knowing). These silly measures do NOT stop people smoking, or starting to smoke. If the government weren't so hypocritical they would either ban smoking, or make them £200 a packet. Of course they won't, because the tax they would lose would be unnaceptable. Why don't they f*** off and go campaign against others who take part in, possibly, fatal activities. They could start with ski-ing, abseiling, mountain climbing, or simply getting out of bed in the morning. We smokers know, and yes, stupidly, accept the risks, so PLEASE get off our backs.

totally agree, once you get going it can be really addicting, which rocks. You really should consider rock climbing, I think per capita it's one of the best workouts and it doesn't feel like working out at all. Huge thrill, not dangerous at all, addicting and as challenging as you want to make it. If you can find a gym, that's a nice safe place to start and you don't need to get on-rope either. Plus, there's no real ceiling to how good you can get. I got tired of running because even running daily and on weekends for distance, I wasn't really getting much faster, and running longer just takes more and more time.

Keep up the good work!

In reply to this comment by EDD:
Thanks - and great to hear about you too! I don't know much and I've seen even less of mountain climbing, but I gotta say, I'm starting to see the appeal and maybe one day I'll try my hand in it - for now and for at least a year yet I'll be primarily a runner/triathlete though. High five for us both turning turning our lives around! Don't you just love the addiction and the post-workout high? :

In reply to this comment by residue:
awesome story! I was in horrible shape long ago and got sick of it.. now I'm an avid rock climber and run a couple half marathons each year. I don't think I ever want to do the full...

In reply to this comment by EDD:
I'm going to work out and work out, and work on it, and keep pushing myself until I can do at least one.
Seriously.

Let me elaborate a bit. A year ago I was a complete couch potato. I couldn't jog for more than a kilometer, couldn't do more than 6 or 7 consecutive pushups - near-zero marks on a fitness scale, basically. That all changed this April, when I finally decided to get of my (fat) ass. I'd already started gradually changing my eating habits since year's end 2010, and in April I finally started working out. For half a year I've been allocating somewhere between an hour and two and a half practically each day for workouts; running almost every other day and in between - also every other day - did bodyweight exercises: started with these, built a routine around them, but recently substituted it for a weightlifting program in a gym. I've lost some 15 kg, I've done the 100 pushups program (yup, pretty much anyone can do it, and in less than six months, too), recently ran my first half-marathon (1:47, very proud of that time), and I'm aiming for 2 marathons (NYC among them, hopefully), a 70k ultra, and a long-course triathlon next year.

So because this is so inspiring to me, and because I want to be able to do what he does, and because I realize now that anyone who sets their mind to it and works towards it relentlessly can do it, let's *doublepromote

Thanks - and great to hear about you too! I don't know much and I've seen even less of mountain climbing, but I gotta say, I'm starting to see the appeal and maybe one day I'll try my hand in it - for now and for at least a year yet I'll be primarily a runner/triathlete though. High five for us both turning turning our lives around! Don't you just love the addiction and the post-workout high?

In reply to this comment by residue:
awesome story! I was in horrible shape long ago and got sick of it.. now I'm an avid rock climber and run a couple half marathons each year. I don't think I ever want to do the full...

In reply to this comment by EDD:
I'm going to work out and work out, and work on it, and keep pushing myself until I can do at least one.
Seriously.

Let me elaborate a bit. A year ago I was a complete couch potato. I couldn't jog for more than a kilometer, couldn't do more than 6 or 7 consecutive pushups - near-zero marks on a fitness scale, basically. That all changed this April, when I finally decided to get of my (fat) ass. I'd already started gradually changing my eating habits since year's end 2010, and in April I finally started working out. For half a year I've been allocating somewhere between an hour and two and a half practically each day for workouts; running almost every other day and in between - also every other day - did bodyweight exercises: started with these, built a routine around them, but recently substituted it for a weightlifting program in a gym. I've lost some 15 kg, I've done the 100 pushups program (yup, pretty much anyone can do it, and in less than six months, too), recently ran my first half-marathon (1:47, very proud of that time), and I'm aiming for 2 marathons (NYC among them, hopefully), a 70k ultra, and a long-course triathlon next year.

So because this is so inspiring to me, and because I want to be able to do what he does, and because I realize now that anyone who sets their mind to it and works towards it relentlessly can do it, let's *doublepromote

This is his risk to take and his alone.


I don't think he's doing something wrong - as you say, it's his choice, and it's not likely he's going to land on someone and kill them too. I'm OK with him taking a risk, and this specific person seems to have a good sense of the risks involved.

Again, what I don't like is this activity (climbing without being safety equipment) being promoted as the way to be a great climber. Whether he (the kid) is trying to inspire copycats or not, having a show about him is going to promote this practice, and further the dangerous idea that this is "the next level" (or something) that climbers should aim for. To be clear, I'm not saying you shouldn't be able to make a show like this or that they should be liable or something - I'm just saying I don't like it because it could have dangerous consequences, and to the extent this practice is promoted we'll see more dead climbers. There are a lot of people who climb, and if the idea gets established that "no ropes" is the cool way to go, people will be more likely to try it.

More people die in their kitchens each year. We accept that. Accidents happen.


Many more people die of heart attacks than AIDS, so why use a condom? This is specious.

But yes, you're right, accidents happen. And when they happen while you're mountain climbing, you're very glad if you've followed reasonable safety practice and you're tied to something (so it's a painful tug instead of certain death). Obviously rock climbing is never going to be perfectly safe (or even "very safe") - but companies like "North Face" (who are tied to this video) should, I think, be promoting the simple practices and equipment that make it significantly safer.

Again, I'm not trying to censor or something, and I think that - for example - Jackass is as harmless as America's Funniest Home Videos. But for an activity like climbing, people aren't always great at assessing risks and are very likely to take cues from "how the pros do it" - and are likely to feel pressure to "up their game" in doing the things other climbers do. Thus I think that no ropes climbing is a dangerous idea to promote.

>> ^jmzero:

I don't like this. I don't like that this kind of behavior is rewarded with attention or seen as elite. This isn't the "top level" of rock/mountain climbing - it is an offshoot.
The danger isn't vague theoretic risk, it's very real and people die every year in predictable, preventable falls (that often get labelled "freak accident" or something only out of respect for the dead).
If you want to be an elite climber, then take harder routes or race/time-trial with proper safety equipment. I'd hate to think that young climbers might feel like this is the "next step" in their progress. It isn't. You can be the best climber without taking this kind of risk. This kid's "per trip survival chance" is probably quite high, but odds often catch up with you if you persist in dangerous behavior (ropes or not, but your odds are better with appropriate equipment). Sometimes you get too confident and make a mistake. Sometimes you don't make a mistake, and you get wiped out by something out of your control.
The climbers I know respect these people, but not what they do. I feel the same.


More people die in their kitchens each year. We accept that. Accidents happen. There is never going to be a lot of people doing this. I don't see him trying to inspire copycats. This is his risk to take and his alone.

In an age where you can't do anything without a fucking risk assessment I applaud this man. He proves that humans can do amazing things.

I don't like this. I don't like that this kind of behavior is rewarded with attention or seen as elite. This isn't the "top level" of rock/mountain climbing - it is an offshoot.

The danger isn't vague theoretic risk, it's very real and people die every year in predictable, preventable falls (that often get labelled "freak accident" or something only out of respect for the dead).

If you want to be an elite climber, then take harder routes or race/time-trial with proper safety equipment. I'd hate to think that young climbers might feel like this is the "next step" in their progress. It isn't. You can be the best climber without taking this kind of risk. This kid's "per trip survival chance" is probably quite high, but odds often catch up with you if you persist in dangerous behavior (ropes or not, but your odds are better with appropriate equipment). Sometimes you get too confident and make a mistake. Sometimes you don't make a mistake, and you get wiped out by something out of your control.

The climbers I know respect these people, but not what they do. I feel the same.

Ok, so now that I'm home looking at my wall of DVD's, I can comment.

Gattaca - one of my favs. Achieving your dreams against the impossible.

The Thing - Big John Carpenter fan here.
Big Trouble in Little China - ditto.
Escape from New York - in triplicate.

Predator - I'm surprised nobody said this one yet. There should be a Predator channel. All Predator, all the time.

Tremors - Silly, but also just a good old-fashioned monster movie.

Die Hard - What Drax said.

Heavy Metal - A guy film to me because I have yet to meet a girl who likes it as much as I do.
Pink Floyd The Wall - see above.

Leon - Masterpiece.

Midnight Run - "Will you shut the fuck up!?!?!?"

Touching the Void - one of the best documentaries I've seen. Plus I love mountain climbing, so I'm partial.

*promote - I hope some folks will take the time and listen to this terrifying tale. And then NOT go mountain-climbing.

A moving and very illuminating account. I don't think I will ever go mountain-climbing as long as there are cheaper, and a lot less riskier thrills than that.

I realize this is long, but here is the Sports illustrated article on these guys...................

Strongest Dad in the World [From Sports Illustrated, By Rick Reilly]

I try to be a good father. Give my kids mulligans. Work nights to pay fortheir text messaging. Take them to swimsuit shoots. But compared with Dick Hoyt, I suck. Eighty-five times he's pushed his disabled son, Rick, 26.2 miles in marathons. Eight times he's not only pushed him 26.2 miles in a wheelchair but also towed him 2.4 miles in a dinghy while swimming and pedaled him 112 miles in a seat on the handlebars--all in the same day.

Dick's also pulled him cross-country skiing, taken him on his back mountain climbing and once hauled him across the U.S. on a bike. Makes taking your son bowling look a little lame, right?

And what has Rick done for his father? Not much--except save his life.

This love story began in Winchester, Mass., 43 years ago, when Rick was
strangled by the umbilical cord during birth, leaving him brain-damaged and unable to control his limbs. "He'll be a vegetable the rest of his life;'' Dick says doctors told him and his wife, Judy, when Rick was nine months old. "Put him in an institution.''

But the Hoyts weren't buying it. They noticed the way Rick's eyes followed them around the room. When Rick was 11 they took him to the engineering department at Tufts University and asked if there was anything to help the boy communicate. "No way,'' Dick says he was told. "There's nothing going on in his brain.'' "Tell him a joke,'' Dick countered. They did. Rick laughed. Turns out a lot was going on in his brain.

Rigged up with a computer that allowed him to control the cursor by touching a switch with the side of his head, Rick was finally able to communicate. First words? "Go Bruins!'' And after a high school classmate was paralyzed in an accident and the school organized a charity run for him, Rick pecked out, "Dad, I want to do that.''

Yeah, right. How was Dick, a self-described "porker'' who never ran more than a mile at a time, going to push his son five miles? Still, he tried. "Then it was me who was handicapped,'' Dick says. "I was sore for two weeks.''

That day changed Rick's life. "Dad,'' he typed, "when we were running, it felt like I wasn't disabled anymore!'' And that sentence changed Dick's life. He became obsessed with giving Rick that feeling as often as he could. He got into such hard-belly shape that he and Rick were ready to try the 1979 Boston Marathon. "No way,'' Dick was told by a race official. The Hoyts weren't quite a single runner, and they weren't quite a wheelchair competitor. For a few years Dick and Rick just joined the massive field and ran anyway, then they found a way to get into the race officially: In 1983 they ran another marathon so fast they made the qualifying time for Boston the following year. Then somebody said, "Hey, Dick, why not a triathlon?''

How's a guy who never learned to swim and hadn't ridden a bike since he was six going to haul his 110-pound kid through a triathlon? Still, Dick tried.
Now they've done 212 triathlons, including four grueling 15-hour Ironmans in Hawaii. It must be a buzzkill to be a 25-year-old stud getting passed by an old guy towing a grown man in a dinghy, don't you think?

Hey, Dick, why not see how you'd do on your own? "No way,'' he says. Dick does it purely for "the awesome feeling'' he gets seeing Rick with a cantaloupe smile as they run, swim and ride together.

This year, at ages 65 and 43, Dick and Rick finished their 24th Boston
Marathon, in 5,083rd place out of more than 20,000 starters. Their best time? Two hours, 40 minutes in 1992--only 35 minutes off the world record, which, in case you don't keep track of these things, happens to be held by a guy who was not pushing another man in a wheelchair at the time.

"No question about it,'' Rick types. "My dad is the Father of the Century.'' And Dick got something else out of all this too. Two years ago he had a mild heart attack during a race. Doctors found that one of his arteries was 95% clogged. "If you hadn't been in such great shape,'' one doctor told him, "you probably would've died 15 years ago.''

So, in a way, Dick and Rick saved each other's life. Rick, who has his own apartment (he gets home care) and works in Boston, and Dick, retired from the military and living in Holland, Mass., always find ways to be together. They give speeches around the country and compete in some backbreaking race every weekend, including this Father's Day. That night, Rick will buy his dad dinner, but the thing he really wants to give him is a gift he can never buy. "The thing I'd most like,'' Rick types, "is that my dad sit in the chair and I push him once.''