[auralpoison]

Actually, in the past few years with Iraq going on, the military has been trying to make the process of getting a waiver for people with minor criminal infractions easier. I think they go from drug experimentation & school fighting to assault & theft of under $500. Hell, the Marines require a waiver if you've ever smoked pot *once*.

Oh, & there was footage of some recruiters recruiting out of county jails a few years back, but I can't find it anywhere. My cousin is a recruiter (He's a Marine) & he hates it. He doesn't outright lie because he can't, but he makes it sound a whole lot better than it is.

[pollystyrene]

What makes me sad about the fact that it was most likely a mental illness (I just can't think of a sane person doing that) is that so many quality care facilities for mentally ill people are serioulsy underfunded and under-appreciated. When stories like this happen, too many people think that all people who are mentally ill are dangerous and should be shut away in some dark closet somewhere as opposed to treated with some compassion as a sick person.

I blame Ronald Reagan. I guess this particular incident was in Canada, but I still blame him.

That sexual assault in the military article was just sickening. I remember something I heard on NPR about a year ago, where they said medics on the battlefront reported lots of cases of female soldiers becoming dehydrated because after a certain time in the evening, they wouldn't drink anything because it would mean having to go out of their barracks after dark and go to the bathroom, risking getting raped by one of the male soldiers. F-ing unbelieveable.

Are these guys rapists back home? They don't allow people with certain criminal histories into the military, do they? I assume this is just some sick power trip (as always, of course.)

[auralpoison]

I've read nothing about the guy possibly being schizophrenic or seriously mentally ill. Not that I'm saying he's not, something clearly went wrong in his mind, but he lived forty years without drawing any suspicion. He held his job for more than a year with no complaints. His wife suspected nothing. To me it sounds more like the guy hit the ceiling emotionally & just went berserker. Money problems, a possible real/perceived slight from a gov't agency or something, a lot of shit can set an otherwise rational person off the deep end. One man may get mad & break something, another may stab, decapitate, & cannibalize an innocent man on a bus.

This pissed me off today.

[culturehandy]

Often times you'll read interviews and comments from the victims family and they are always so dead set against someone going to a care facility for a time until they get better. What they don't realize is that putting someone so ill in a prison is that is accomomplishes nothing. Being in a care facility would be much worse. and often times people with paranoid schizophrenia don't get better. You can control schizophrenia but it never goes away.

In the press conference the RCMP held, the officer giving the information to the press was very upset and said even the most season of officers would have been disturbed by this.

It's a horrible situation for everyone involved. The victim and his family, the passengers aboard the bus and the suspect. Can you imagine how horrible it would be to hear voices telling you things? I've dealt with paranoid schizophrenics before and they are very unhappy people. wouldn't you if you were living like that?

[kittenb]

What makes me sad about the fact that it was most likely a mental illness (I just can't think of a sane person doing that) is that so many quality care facilities for mentally ill people are serioulsy underfunded and under-appreciated. When stories like this happen, too many people think that all people who are mentally ill are dangerous and should be shut away in some dark closet somewhere as opposed to treated with some compassion as a sick person.

[culturehandy]

This is big news here.

And I live in this province.

I heart those comments, especially the last one about our "utopia" abd our stalinist big-brother like politics??? Bwaaaaahahahahahaha, that's like the pot calling the kettle black.

anyhows, the first thing I though when I heard this was mental illness. I suspect scizophrenia, as it was totally unprovoked. There was something in the paper here about the same.

[kittenb]

What the hell? http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/wor...a-13926147.html

Ignore the comments (of course.) I really want to talk to these people who keep thinking that had they been there they would have made a difference.

Actually, had you been there, with your big American gun, I think it is likely more people would have died.

[pollystyrene]

Gah, if I were that judge, I'd add time to his sentence for bullshit like that.

Reminded me of this story I saw on CNN, today.

[auralpoison]

It's okay to fuck a fourteen year old if she's from Brazil or the Congo. It's a cultural thing.

[freckleface7]

you know at first I was going to lower our flag to 1/2 mast,, but then wasn't sure bc he was retired, but then started learning more about all the shitty things he'd done and said to hell with it (we're not from nc, just live here) and decided to leave Old Glory as she was, blazing in full wind celebrating and honoring the Nation's Birthday, something that seemed so much better than to make a mockery of it with a man like that.

funny that story should make the chicago tribune but I don't recall it being on the local news here, where it happened at.

[Divala]

Good for him!

[vixen_within]

Hey that's excellent!

[pollystyrene]

This makes me happy.

[dj-bizmonkey]

i am so happy for this couple: http://abcnews.go.com/Health/story?id=5302756&page=1

[pherber]

That makes me so fucking sick!
How the church just loves children:
Fucking feotus is holy and must be born, but they don't give a shit about the misery of a child that got raped.



freckle, ewww!

[freckleface7]

the news story about the pregnant female soldier being killed in the hotel?

it's in the city I live, about 3 mls from us.
there is even talk (via the N & O's sensationalist reporting style..) of a{possibly fledgling} serial killer being on the loose here.

lovely.

[neurotic.nelly]

Neither the government nor the church should have sovereignty over any human being. The more ethical pursuit for the government and church is to find the child rapist!!!

[pollystyrene]

Same thing happened a few years ago with that little girl in a Central American country (Nicaragua, El Salvador?) who was 9 years old. The Catholic church didn't want her to be allowed to get an abortion after she was raped by a soldier.

There was an interview with her, where they asked her what she wanted to do and she said she didn't want to have a baby because she didn't want to have to share her toys with it. That certainly puts her age in perspective for you. She did end up being allowed to travel to Mexico or Panama or some place to get an abortion at a private hospital.

[girltrouble]

that's just dumb, culture. she's freaking 11. she's been raped. that's just fucked up, but figures the church had to stick it's nose into that....*shakes her head in disgust*

[culturehandy]

Oh now this is just disgusting.