Coverage of latest American mass shooting

But in America. guns are very much part of everyday life, which is what I meant by the recreation part. They are not just used for killing, and protection. They are multi purpose.

There is not much you can do with a gun, except kill someone you don't like, defend yourself against someone trying to kill you, threaten someone into doing as you want, kill something as "sport" or practise your aim so that you can do one of those things more effectively.

All these were reasonable when America was a frontier country (except threatening someone) but it is now supposed to be civilised.

I don't share the view the news coverage has been excessive. The UK shares a common language with the US and there are historical and current links. The gun culture was born out of the American frontiers and the UK was a key player in the slave trade/plantations.

Obama's heart felt comments about other 1st world countries not facing this kind of mass murder so frequently would have included the Uk and other european countries. British police have been involved in helping US police to change their approach to managing conflicts, without the use of guns. As a result of the kind of work I did, I often worked closely with the police here. The ability of the average police officer to calm a potentially out of control situation is something we should all be proud of. It seems the US wants to learn from us - good.

TVs and radios can be switched off nowadays, can't they? Just checking.

This was not a gun crime, it was a racist crime. And it is important that we in Europe are aware that in the USA, especially in the Southern Slave States, extreme supremacist racism, with KKK still very much alive despite being officially illegal, is still very much alive and the reality- and accepted by a significant % of the population. Since when have the news and Press in the UK supposed to only deal with local problems? Looking at what is happening elsewhere often serves as a lesson to al, wherever they are.

granjura The southern states of the USA – the ones LBJ reckoned the Democrats had lost for decades once he signed the paper – aren't slave states any more. Of course, there are still rednecks but, generally, it's been long time since trees bore "strange fruit". Sadly, some people will always hate irrationally those who are easily identified as being different, whether black, brown, Jewish, Moslem, whatever. So crimes of this sort may well be racist but are also gun crimes, in that guns are used and readily available.

America really does need to learn that it isn't a cowboy movie any more.

I too am impressed with the forgiveness shown by the bereaved families - they are the ones who are suffering and it is their place to forgive, and how impressive that they have done so.

The attitude to guns in the US is frankly plain sick - and as to the comment by the guy from the gun lobby - it defies belief. I do not believe that any president will have the courage to stand up to this powerful lobby.

I don't think it is possible for those of us who do not live in the same country, let alone the area where this killing happened, to really know what people there think. Many residents of USA much further north do not believe that the racism in the southern areas has disappeared.
The idea of the Plantations with slave dwellings is still very much alive in the state albeit as a tourist attraction. This does keep the idea of 'how it was' alive in the minds of the population. To me the sight and knowledge of how it used to be was awful and I could not understand how one human being could act in that manner to another. It is not so far back in history that Rosa Parks and people such as Martin Luther King made such an impression. Only recently have books such as The Secret Life of Bees, and The Help brought this period of history to the fore again. The sequel to the Mocking Bird will be due out shortly - although it was written first in story chronological terms it is the sequel.
It is likely to be very difficult to change the gun laws in USA but maybe a start could be made by raising the age that having a gun is legal. This young man was hardly more than a boy and at an age when opinions are still being formed. It is a tragedy for him whatever the outcome of any trial - his life also has been irrecovably changed and that of his family by his stupid, uncaring and racist behaviour. I cannot believe that his family had no idea of the opinions he held and had shared with some of his peer group - they only had to see the clothes he wore and photos he posed for.
So many lives changed in a few seconds.

absent I agree with much you say. But have you ever talked to some of those people, and see how mixed couples are still treated?

I mentioned the book before, and of course it is about post-war Alabama- when slavery is supposed to be all over, and all equals. Blacks in Southern States still are economically at the very bottom of society.

Mudbound by Hilary Jordan

And of course remember the treatment of little Ruby Bridges- the first black child to go to a normal USA state school in Mississipi and how she was treated... Now I know, that was in the past, a very long time ago.

But was it in the 20s, in the 30s, in the 40s... It was in 1960- so very recent, she is about our age now, and very much of our generation. And although things have moved forwards quite a bit.... it is still a different world in those deep Southern States. The whites who do mix with black and worse intermarry, are actually treated even worse.

Utterly bizarre when an ideology prohibits mixing with members of the same branch of a species.

But why would a twenty one year old man have such hatred in him? There must be much more to it than deep south ingrained racism. Mental and emotional troubles must have played a huge role. Another mixed up kid.

yep, it is always very complex and so many things get mixed up for those kids. Be they Muslim or Christians, white or black or brown or whatever. I think that was the point some of us were trying to make that this sort of action by a white male = he was mad- and by a black or Muslim male = he was a terrorist. They are all mixed up and twisted for many many reasons- all of them.