5 Dead in College Shooting...

[wanna be drummer]

To be honest, I really don't know the answer why, but I would like to know, in particular, why school shootings seem to be such a problem in the USA.

It would seem we have more psychotic bitches in our country. If a kid, like the guy at Virginia Tech., wants to go on a murderous rampage, he will do it, no matter where in the world he lives. I guess it just happens that some of the American youth's psyches are skewed and demented. Our guns don't really have anything to do with that. There are guns in other countries, where the public has handguns or rifles, but they don't use them at schools. Why? It's not the number of guns, but the problem of the minds of those who have them

[Mangani]

Someone's a little upset. Calm down there bud. My thing is, the Scots and the Welsh and even the Irish, were not originally happy, I'm sure, when they saw English knights riding into their homeland, yes?

But you missed the point I was making. The others, particularly the Scots, also came into England and caused havok. It wasn't just one way. That's the point I was getting at....hence the Hadrien's Wall remark. The Scots were invading and pillaging northern England long before the English went into Scotland and kicked their bums for good. For centuries the Romans, Vikings and Normans had come into England and took over the place. The Scots, Welsh and Irish don't have the monopoly on being invaded by outsiders. The English just don't whinge about it.

Of course they weren't happy. My family is half Irish and the resentment towards the English smolders to this very day...

...and yet the English don't resent Italians because of the Romans or resent the Scandinavians because of the Vikings etc etc etc. They don't even resent the Germans for WW2 and that was much more recent. Fact is that 'some' in the Celtic nations like to wallow in self pity with a chip on their shoulder and don't move on. They like to live in the past 150 to 300 years ago. It's part of their nature I guess. If you listen to some Irish, you'd think Ireland is the only country to have ever suffered LOL. I'm sure the Jews and the Russians/Ukrainians could teach the Irish a thing or two about 'suffering'.

On the other hand Irish 'resentment' towards the English hasn't stopped millions of them from moving to and living in England. Even my postman is a Paddy.

In the same way, I would find it ridiculous if modern Native Americans still resented modern 'white European' Americans for what happened 150 years ago. What's done is done.....although the difference there I guess is that modern 'white European' Americans are still there on native lands whereas the modern English aren't.

[Del Zeppnile]

To be honest, I really don't know the answer why, but I would like to know, in particular, why school shootings seem to be such a problem in the USA.

In the overall scheme of things they are less of a problem than reckless driving by students while on school property, or going to and from school. In one of our local schools there has been four deaths in that respect just in the last two years.

[Mangani]

Driving accidents/deaths are also a problem in America. It's three times the rate of Britain and from what I can see a large proportion dying are youngsters like Del Zeppnile said.

Maybe the minimum driving age should be raised? I think it's way too low here. It's 17 here and I think even that is too low.

[wanna be drummer]

Driving accidents/deaths are also a problem in America. It's three times the rate of Britain and from what I can see a large proportion dying are youngsters like Del Zeppnile said.

Maybe the minimum driving age should be raised? I think it's way too low here. It's 17 here and I think even that is too low.

No way, it's 16 here. Most of us drive just fine, it's just that some people are idiots. If the driving age goes up, then there should also be an age limit for driving, because old drivers (who drive slowly and cause tons of traffic) piss me off more then teenagers do

[wanna be drummer]

But you missed the point I was making. The others, particularly the Scots, also came into England and caused havok. It wasn't just one way. That's the point I was getting at....hence the Hadrien's Wall remark. The Scots were invading and pillaging northern England long before the English went into Scotland and kicked their bums for good. For centuries the Romans, Vikings and Normans had come into England and took over the place. The Scots, Welsh and Irish don't have the monopoly on being invaded by outsiders. The English just don't whinge about it.

The Scots and the Irish didn't leave their islands to conquer other parts of the world.

Look, I'm not saying England is completely at fault for British imperialism or what have you, but you can't play down their part

[Gainsbarre]

...and yet the English don't resent Italians because of the Romans or resent the Scandinavians because of the Vikings etc etc etc. They don't even resent the Germans for WW2 and that was much more recent. Fact is that 'some' in the Celtic nations like to wallow in self pity with a chip on their shoulder and don't move on. They like to live in the past 150 to 300 years ago. It's part of their nature I guess. If you listen to some Irish, you'd think Ireland is the only country to have ever suffered LOL. I'm sure the Jews and the Russians/Ukrainians could teach the Irish a thing or two about 'suffering'.

On the other hand Irish 'resentment' towards the English hasn't stopped millions of them from moving to and living in England. Even my postman is a Paddy.

But it goes a bit deeper than that.

First of all you have to remember that Britain ruled Ireland for a long long time, and that rule, it has to be said, was a very oppressing one.

Another thing you also have to remember is that in England, for a long time, the Irish were looked down upon. I mean not even the Irish but other English people suffered social snobbery. You must've heard John Lennon say that Liverpudlians were considered the "Niggers of England".

And, well I mean you demonstrate it yourself when you say:

Even my postman is a Paddy.

You know that's like saying "My Doctor is a Kraut" or "my teacher is a curry-muncher" or "this wog cut me off at the traffic lights" or "My last girlfriend was a choco". If you use slang words that indicates a particular nationality or race, then you are reducing that person to a sub-standard level of cultural and racial stereotype.

The reason why I was born in Australia is because my Grandmother moved to London from Ireland during the war, and her and my Grandfather (who was Irish Liverpudlian) decided there was too much poverty in Ireland to move back to, and too much hostility in England to stay, so they decided to come to Australia in the 50's. Which was a suitable move because Australia at that time had heaps of economic opportunity, but also a social attitude very similar to Ireland. Australians and the Irish have more in common than with the English.

So it's not just the historical situation that breeds that resenment, it's also the attitudes that have carried on over the years.

For example just after the War, the English woman that my grandmother was living with said to her "Well, they'll be sending all you Irish back soon, now that the war is finished and you've all done your jobs". And comments like that, which were common at the time, pissed my Grandmother off no-end. Ireland wasn't even involved in WW2, but they came to England to help the English, and after the war it was kinda a case of "okay, piss off back to Ireland now".

So to her, there was no loved lost between the Irish and the English. She felt Britain had kept Ireland impoverished, and so when they had to leave to make money, and they came to Britain, they were treated as outcasts. And for a long time, right up until even the 1970's, The Irish in England were always considered to be the criminals or the troublemakers or generally dodgey or untrustworthy people.

Things like Northern Ireland also didn't help relations. The Irish were particularly offended that the Orange Men were not only allowed to but assisted by the British to conduct their sometimes aggressive marches through Catholic neighbourhoods.

Then you get things like the IRA which certainly didn't help matters either.

But, especially in Northern Ireland you have to examine the context of what was happening. For example, the Pro-British Church of England Northern Irish called themselves The Orange Men. This name came about because of King William III of Britain, who was originally from the royal house of Orange-Nassau (based in The Netherlands). William, through the Williamite War in Ireland, crushed the Irish and finally established full British control over Ireland and the imposition of the strict Penal Laws which were aimed directly at Irish Catholics.

So when you have the Orange Men and their name representing and promoting the oppressive colonial rule of Ireland by the English, then obviously you're still going to have strong resentment...

And don't forget too, that Ireland didn't actually get it's Independence until 1922, so we are only 2 or 3 generations away from British Colonial rule of Ireland, which had been going on for a couple of hundred years, so you know, things take time.

So you have lots of Irish in England? Yes you do. But you also have lots of Indians and Pakistanis and Africans... That's a legacy from when Britain was a Colonial empire. In an ironic twist of fate, all the colonial subjects of British empire have now flocked to England and are turning large sections of London into downtown Mumbai...Maybe it's Karma biting Britain on the arse, who knows? And you also see it in other countries that were formally Colonial empires like France...There's a lot of Africans and Muslims in France who all came from the French colonial territories. Same with The Netherlands.

Anyway, that's just a deeper look at the situation. I'm not slagging off against Britain or the English as I do happen to be a British citizen myself, but it's just a bit of an explanation as to why you have the resentment.

[wanna be drummer]

Good post.

Off-topic, but Mangani, are you a guy or a girl? I'm just curious. No offense meant or anything