You argue there’s risk in conflating one type of mass shooting with another (domestic violence or criminal pursuit vs. ‘rampaging’) because it changes how policy would be considered, while simultaneously conflating two very different types of mass shooting (psychological instability vs. ideological terrorism) as one and the same. The policy strategy to prevent these two types of violence, I hope you’d agree, would be quite different.

From my point of view, this is the inherent problem with the viewpoint you are trying to defend. You’re trying to bucket some shootings as acceptable and some as bad, and that’s a point, but that’s not the point.

If there was a standard legal or academic definition of mass shooting, and this organization was using an alternate standard, I would see and support your point, but your argument is that in an ill defined space, one organizations definition isnt the same as yours, and is therefore wrong. It’s not tenable as far as I can see. You use this idea of ‘most people’ as some kind of yardstick, which it can’t be in any formal way. It’s sort a nothingism used to attack something with the weight of popular thinking, but not really a viable standard of any kind.

Are you saying that we should have Allowlists vs. Denylists for types of gun violence that are acceptable? This seems to be the fundamental premise upon which we disagree…

From my POV, intention is immaterial because there are no ‘good’ gun deaths, so splitting hairs has no values.

It sounds to me like you’re saying if you go to a mall and have a mass shooting in a totally sober state, that’s bad, but if you get hopped up on bath salts and then have a good old fashioned shotgun rampage, that’s ok and we shouldn’t count those ones…

Your explaining the difference but not explaining why it makes a difference.

To matters of gun regulation, of safety in public spaces, of trauma to the affected, of national reputation (pick any one, or all, or something else) why does the intent change anything?

I’ll start off: To have the intention to mass-murder purely for the sake of mass murder could be worth isolating and studying because that is a specific and extreme psychological problem worth solving. However, not all mass killings (with intent, for your sake) will have that psychological trigger at root. A religious or racial extremist, for example, is different than a disaffected teenager.

In this circumstance, intent is interesting if one is interested in those other things (psychological issues in American youth, the spread of religious and racial extremism), but ultimately are secondary issues when it comes to measuring gun violence. A mass stabbing by a racial extremist, or a teenager blowing up their high school with fertilizer would still need to be measured.

You are complaining about this organization’s yardstick, but I don’t hear a compelling alternative from you for this specific measure. You are saying they should be measuring a totally different thing, which is arguably irrelevant to this measure.

I’m not sure I understand why intent matters (barring accidents, I suppose)?

Who cares what the intent was if guns were involved and people were hurt or died?

If a person is suffering from schizophrenia and thinks they are holding a magic wand, but actually shoot up a mall, they don’t have intent but the gun violence still resulted in death. Would that not be a mass shooting in your intent-based definition?

Was it? It was fine – that thing you throw on because you’ve watched most of everything else that fills that kind of derivative political action conspiracy thriller. Not particularly intelligent, not particularly funny, a loose enough plot that you can be paying attention once every 5 minutes and get by. Some folks get shot. There’s a conspiracy ooooOOOOoooh.

Maybe that’s what defines good these days, when content is just a glut of mediocrity.

I was shocked it was up top the list in terms of ‘quality,’ but I watched it because, it was there… So, I guess that explains it?

The Recruit (similar vein) was a superior show in terms of quality. Recommend that if you need a quick fix.

Technically true, but it needs to be non militarized, can’t purchase the missile mounts (or the missiles etc.). My point stands.

But this already isn’t true. Even if I could afford it, I can’t buy an F16, anthrax or a nuclear warhead. So, isn’t this just about where the line is being drawn? The line itself both already exists and doesn’t seem to be contested.

Pretty sure Elon was first to the key, and the rest have followed suit.

In seriousness, though, the primary driver is the VC tap slowing down significantly and forcing long term business strategy to lean much harder into its existing opportunities vs. planning for periodic cash infusion from investors. A lot of these businesses never had to set themselves up for success in the absence of that capital, and it’s led to bad practices and product strategies.

I love this sentiment, and it can be true, but it also creates this idea that ‘heart’ alone has a high bearing on whether or not a product of any kind (book, film, statue, game) will be successful in its market ambitions.

It doesn’t always correlate. I would argue if often doesn’t correlate. Any indie film or game fest is chock full of projects with a ton of heart. Few of them graduate to success in the market place.

I’m not saying heart is a bad thing. It’s a damn great thing. But strong business fundamentals are a good thing too. And sometimes, you also just need that extra bit of luck or uncontrollable virality too. To find success, you stack the deck with as many good plays as you can, and heart is one of them.

Success is not a recipe, and if it was, everybody would be doing it…