Two journalists killed in shooting during live newscast at Smith Mountain Lake

originally posted by: Hellas
In the second video taken by the shooter himself, he shoots multiple times at the woman first. I don't know how she even managed to run after those shots.

ETA: How come nobody saw him while he was pointing his gun at her in the beginning?

Because reporters and camera people always focus on their interview subject or else the TV news subject pieces would be nothing but attention seeking jerks waving their arms.

a reply to: avgguy

They should, because that's exactly what it was

Anyone notice that the cameraman is not filming the interview, but filming off to the side?

a reply to: raedar

Yes. He's filming the area. Which is the subject of the interview.

And then turns to film the interview.

Have you never seen a live on-air spot where the camera is looking at something while the reporter talks?

Point blank, as I look at his previous tweets today (even beyond those most quoted in the news media), and as I look at his past actions, I see a very troubled individual. A very vain one. His overt racism wasn't the "root cause" of his actions today, but they were a very big part of them. The ROOT cause of today's tragedy was his ingrained narcissism. Only a vain narcissist would repeatedly tweet baby pictures and modeling pictures of his younger self imploring of his followers to tell him "how beautiful he was". Only a narcissist will respond to their own failures with false and unbacked claims of prejudice or it being the fault and blame of others that they weren't where they wanted to be in life. (they simply will not be told they aren't good enough in life) Only a narcissist "go-pros" his ignorant and deadly attack on two innocent citizens that had nothing to do with his life's failures and posts them all of Twitter with on-going commentary, while he is running from police. And only a narcissist would self profess to wanting be the sole harbinger of a larger race war through his senseless and sickening actions.

His resulting confrontational actions (reportedly) in the workplace were a psychopathic side effect of that narcissism. His delusional nature was a psychopathic side effect of that narcissism. That he wrote the initials of one Charleston shooting victim on each bullet that was used in today's attack was a psychopathic side effect of that narcissism. That he wrote a 23-page manifesto is a psychopathic side effect of that narcissism. That he was a racist was a psychopathic side effect of that narcissism. And the ultimate crescendo of it all today was a psychopathic side effect of his extreme narcissism.

We need to quit with the distractive debates that have absolutely nothing to do with the events at hand. When are we going to start taking the mental health of individuals in this society more seriously than we have? We could solve a majority of our issues today if we pulled our heads out of the sand (or our asses in some cases) and confronted this problem head on. This was a sick individual who had no reason to be walking the streets. Surely he had to be enabled by those who surrounded him and remained silent to his state of mind to do so each day. Some very real questions need to be asked now, not just regarding his private background, but the private backgrounds of his friends and family as well. This goes very much deeper than simply Vester Lee Flanagan ...

a reply to: 19Hondo

I'm pretty sure that this would qualify as a snuff film, correct?


Disgusting and sad.

It's ironic that the video filmed by the shooter will give more clues than that of the camera man. It's in higher resolution too. Wish I could slow it down to see if anything on the reporter or beyond her was hit by the bullets.

It just occurred to me that this moron was trying to aim and shoot by looking at his cellphone camera! If any of you have tried to reach out and touch something you're filming while looking at the screen, you know it takes practice to be accurate. That explains why he had to shoot 15 times. OMG!

a reply to: Jubilation T Cornpone

APPLAUSE!!

When are we going to start taking the mental health of individuals in this society more seriously than we have? We could solve a majority of our issues today if we pulled our heads out of the sand (or our asses in some cases) and confronted this problem head on. This was a sick individual who had no reason to be walking the streets. Surely he had to be enabled by those who surrounded him and remained silent to his state of mind to do so each day. Some very real questions need to be asked now about, not just regarding his private background, but the private backgrounds of his friends and family as well. This goes very much deeper than simply Vester Lee Flanagan ...

Excellent post, and spot on. Go, you!!!
Your teammate,
Buzzy

a reply to: Shamrock6

Good call, I have never seen it from this angle. Ugh, very sad.

originally posted by: BuzzyWigs
a reply to: Jubilation T Cornpone

APPLAUSE!!

When are we going to start taking the mental health of individuals in this society more seriously than we have? We could solve a majority of our issues today if we pulled our heads out of the sand (or our asses in some cases) and confronted this problem head on. This was a sick individual who had no reason to be walking the streets. Surely he had to be enabled by those who surrounded him and remained silent to his state of mind to do so each day. Some very real questions need to be asked now about, not just regarding his private background, but the private backgrounds of his friends and family as well. This goes very much deeper than simply Vester Lee Flanagan ...

Excellent post, and spot on. Go, you!!!
Your teammate,
Buzzy

Seriously, that was so articulate and to the point - every word of it. THAT'S the message we should take away from this - when will we start addressing mental health and having open discussions about it instead of having it be something people are ashamed of or simply called "a loony" etc. we need to face the problem head on

originally posted by: JackReyes
a reply to: 19Hondo

I'm pretty sure that this would qualify as a snuff film, correct?


Disgusting and sad.

No a snuff film is someone being killed on film and then the video sold for profit, that doesn't include non connected people recording what happened and then selling to news stations.

originally posted by: matafuchs
He was not crazy. This is not an issue about mental health. It is not an issue of anything but hate. He hated the establishment. He felt slighted. In his note he references his thoughts on a killing at the church. He talks about being gay. He talks about not fitting in with any race even being messed with by black men. He was walked from his job he was so angry when fired.

So, we have a bullied,gay,racist man with anger issues. Sounds like 10's of million in the US. This is about hate...not guns.

PS...I counted at least 15 rounds fired. He made sure the two were dead....

Quoted for truth.

A sad day, but I'm glad there won't be any more violence from him.

originally posted by: Jubilation T Cornpone
When are we going to start taking the mental health of individuals in this society more seriously than we have? We could solve a majority of our issues today if we pulled our heads out of the sand (or our asses in some cases) and confronted this problem head on.

Absolutely spot on.
Unfortunately, it's not going to happen, because mental illness is still a taboo in America and still treated with the kind of disregard it used to be treated with in the UK twenty years ago.

Nothing will change, and next week you'll have another shooting by another mentally disturbed person who also exhibited all of these signs for years without anyone doing anything about it.

The problem in the US seems to be that you've allowed your pharmaceutical companies to hijack mental health to such a degree that people believe simply feeling "sad" is something that can be solved with a pill, giving people the impression that anyone can deal with any psychological problem by just taking a dose of whatever was being advertised ten minutes ago.

American culture seems to have degraded mental health to such a degree that everyone has a "condition" or an "anxiety", when in actual fact those millions of people popping pills to deal with their supposed problem are really feeling nothing more than HUMAN EMOTIONS. This has left those suffering from real and genuine psychological issues being disregarded and left to deal with problems that a pill just can't fix.

I've tried to bring this up on ATS before, after seeing some very clearly unbalanced people making some extremely worrying threads clearly brought on by a condition which was not being treated, and the thread was shot down within moments as "not our problem".

originally posted by: Jubilation T Cornpone
When are we going to start taking the mental health of individuals in this society more seriously than we have? We could solve a majority of our issues today if we pulled our heads out of the sand (or our asses in some cases) and confronted this problem head on. This was a sick individual who had no reason to be walking the streets..

Well if this is the case then we better get a firm grip because extreme narcissism is very alive today and being re-enforced everywhere we turn. Hollywood actors, politicians, sports figures, Facebook selfie's, etc.....

But in other cases the symptoms manifest in different reactions.

So what now do we start locking everyone up that exhibits these tendencies?

It's not that easy.

Jelous sick man , that's wat his problem was.. real sad it has to end their lives this way.. It also showed real strength of the cameraman to film the killer in his dying moments. That's why the coward tried to end his live ,he probably thought to get away with this..

originally posted by: raedar
Anyone notice that the cameraman is not filming the interview, but filming off to the side?

Often in a news cast, the camera will pan away from the broadcasters to focus on something related to the story.

I'm sure you have watched the news before so, I'm not sure how you could not already know this.

But anyway, there is your answer. No conspiracy or foul play. Just normal broadcasting.

Ok, so when do we decide that something like this is a symptom of mental illness as opposed to a racially motivated hate crime?

I don't recall much time being spent wondering whether or not Dylan Rooff was mentally ill once the details like this manifesto came out. Most everyone agreed he had racial animus.

But this guy is mentally ill, not acting out of animus?

Not sure I get where we draw the line here.

originally posted by: Hellas
In the second video taken by the shooter himself, he shoots multiple times at the woman first. I don't know how she even managed to run after those shots.

ETA: How come nobody saw him while he was pointing his gun at her in the beginning?

that is exactly my point from a few pages back. furthermore, the interviewee didnt even see the guy creep up along that platform to get behind the cameraman??

originally posted by: Jubilation T Cornpone
When are we going to start taking the mental health of individuals in this society more seriously than we have?

One more in agreement.

But to add, I think we need to look at the combination of several factors to comprehensively deal with gun violence. We can't address it by focusing on one thing, because it's not one thing that causes it. It's a combination of factors.

If we were to focus on mental health, easy gun access and the social and economic aspects of those who most commonly commit gun violence, we could have a big impact on this kind of dreadful crime.

It's very sad that people continue to argue over the single cause, when there are several. If everyone agreed that maybe we SHOULD address the factors simultaneously, We might actually be successful.

Very sad story!