Aurora CO Theater Massacre

[Freitag]

James Holmes Tumblr 'Holmies' Shock Internet

In the wake of the shooting at a movie theater in Aurora, Colo., a support group has rallied around the alleged gunman, James Holmes.

More than two dozen Holmes-related Tumblr pages have sprouted up since the shooting. Referring to themselves as "Holmies," many supporters use the suspect's pictures in avatars. Most of the bloggers are teenagers, sharing and reblogging mugshots and signs that say "I Love The Holmies."

Holmes, 24, was charged with a total of 142 criminal counts including 24 counts of first-degree murder on Monday. He was arrested on July 20, after allegedly killing 12 people and wounding 58 at a local midnight showing of The Dark Knight Rises.

Tumblr users such as FreeHolmes urge fans to write to Holmes -- including in the page a link to the Arapahoe County Sheriff's Office inmate mail procedures. The blog's subhead reads, "This is going to be 90% pictures and I must admit I'm on James side." On the page, there's a collection of James Holmes GIFs, caricatures and fan-made comics.

Tumblr user JamesHolmesLover86 explains participation in the trend: "As a James Holmes supporter, I do not support what he did. I support him in the sense that I feel bad for him and that his mental state was not in the right place. People are so quick to judge him when there’s probably a lot more going on then what we know about."

Some who noticed the social media trend have taken to Twitter to convey their unease.

Frank McDevitt @frank_mcdevitt

Some teenage girls have created a fandom around James Holmes and call themselves "Holmies". I can't decide if I'm angry or sad.
31 Jul 12

Good morning: these people are horrifying. tumblr.com/tagged/holmies

— Meredith Modzelewski (@meredithmo) July 31, 2012

Tumblr is not the only social media site to host supportive sentiment for the alleged shooter. A James Holmes Facebook fan page with about 800 "likes" was recently removed. While "incredibly distasteful," the Facebook page didn't violate the company's terms and conditions, a Facebook spokesperson told CNN. It is unclear who took the page down.

Mashable has reached out to Tumblr for comment about the content.

Should companies be responsible for taking down user-created content considered distasteful? Share your thoughts in the comments.

Screenshot of Jamesholmie.tumblr.com.

This story originally published on Mashable here.

[justdrew]

[Hammer of Los]

...

Has this man been convicted yet?

Has he been identified by witnesses positively as the shooter?

How can that be if he was masked?

Why has the media constantly referred to him as if he was a convicted mass murderer as soon as he is taken into custody?

Because the police tell the media he is certainly guilty?

Is it the job of the police to find someone guilty?

No.

This;

People are so quick to judge him when there’s probably a lot more going on than what we know about.

...

[undead]

[Duplicate post deleted]

[Hammer of Los]

...

You can find a brief video of John Jacobson, the man cited by the 18 year old Holmes as his "mentor" on the 'net.

Jacobson seems more than eager to distance himself from that claim.

One could hardly blame him for that.

You can watch the short video of him on this page (I think it's already been mentioned);

http://www.conscious-pictures.com/chron ... o_cc1.html

"The Consciousness Chronicles."

At least on that page of videos, he is among many prestigious names.

I notice many names I recognise.

Also Esalen.

And the Institute.

I think I'll hold back on that job application.

...

[Hammer of Los]

...

I don't think he shot anyone, to be honest.

...

[undead]

Has he been identified by witnesses positively as the shooter?

How can that be if he was masked?

Yeah, that's a good point. And the nose issue. And, somebody mentioned this to me recently - how did he shoot so many people? Wouldn't he need to reload? Didn't he allegedly shoot people in the next theater, also? Maybe I'm behind on this, I haven't been following it so closely. Although considering his Psychiatrist was apparently writing herself prescriptions for Xanax and other such filth this doesn't surprise me in the least.

[Hammer of Los]

...

Maybe I'm behind on this, I haven't been following it so closely.

Very wise.

Total rabbit hole territory.

It's a good job I got a hard hat and a powerful lamp.

Last night I held Aladdin's lamp,
So I wished that I could stay.
Before the thing could answer me
Well someone came took the lamp away.

I looked around,
A lousy candle's all I found.

...

[Wombaticus Rex]

how did he shoot so many people? Wouldn't he need to reload? Didn't he allegedly shoot people in the next theater, also?

Think about what a gas-powered automatic assault rifle is for a second and all those questions should hopefully get less baffling. Given the sardine-can proximity of a packed movie theater and the abundant projectile stream of the AR-15, most of the people shot were hit in the initial barrage prior to the AR-15 jamming. Aiming a fully automatic weapon is often referred to as a matter of "pray and spray" - especially with smaller, higher-volume pieces of shit like Uzis. Simply depressing the trigger and making a general "swathing" motion will lay up an effectively solid wall of flesh-piercing, organ-grinding death, and that wall is formed entirely of projectiles capable of flying clear through a cheap ANSI Chinese drywall barrier and the (very minimal) soundproofing of your average multiplex strip mall building. Switching out to pistols would require the shooter to be much more engaged and actively selecting targets.

However, given the timeframe and circumstances, I'm not confused about how the shooter claimed so many victims.

Pretty much everything else, I'm confused about.

[Hammer of Los]

...

It rather appears as if the answer is always time, after all.

...

[undead]

Yeah, okay. I didn't realize what kind of gun he had. But look at this:

James Holmes Survivor: 'Batman' Shooter Deserves SLOW, PAINFUL DEATH


"Batman" shooter James Holmes doesn't just deserve the death penalty ... he deserves the worst, most painful death possible -- so says one of the survivors of the massacre.

22-year-old Carli Richards -- whom Holmes shot in the back with a shotgun -- tells TMZ, "I think death by firing squad would be totally justified ... Just injecting him is painless."

She says, "I had enough needles in me that night to know that a needle isn't that bad. I want him to see what it feels like ... I wish someone would shoot him and let him bleed out."

She adds, "He shot me with stuff they use to shoot birds and deer. I want him to feel what it's like to feel that helpless."

Thankfully, Carli and her boyfriend made it to safety before Holmes could kill them -- but Carli says she's still in a lot of pain, and can't go back to work yet with her current injuries.

Carli is the second person affected by the massacre to call for Holmes' death. TMZ broke the story yesterday, the husband of a woman killed in the shooting also demanded the death penalty.

It's worth nothing because prosecutors have said they will only consider pursuing the death penalty with support from the victims' families.

Holmes was charged Monday with 142 crimes stemming from the Colorado shooting -- including 24 1st degree murder counts, and 116 counts of attempted murder.

If he's found guilty of 1st degree murder, he faces the death penalty by lethal injection.

http://www.tmz.com/2012/08/01/james-hol ... ty-prison/

The link has a picture of her wounds from a shotgun. So he also had a shotgun?

[Hammer of Los]

...

Jeez man I ain't got time.

There's seems to be a little confusion as to what weapon(s) were actually used in the assault.

Not to mention how many shooters/accomplices.

I'm not a big physical details guy.

You might know that by now.

I'm more into the big picture.

But maybe some sleuth could help out with this one.

...

[AhabsOtherLeg]

22-year-old Carli Richards -- whom Holmes shot in the back with a shotgun -- tells TMZ, "I think death by firing squad would be totally justified ... Just injecting him is painless."

She's one of the military (naval) victims, a reservist I think, and wrote a pretty dubious piece shortly after the event where she more or less said that those who died in the shootings had been killed because they weren't as awesome and all-American as she is. They took too long to react to danger, she says, and some barely moved at all, whereas she and her boyfriend bravely Ayn Randed themselves right out of the theatre by their bootstraps. It was a pretty disgusting bit of victim blaming, but I didn't want to post it up because I thought she might've still been in shock when she wrote it, or maybe just isn't a very good writer, or was struggling with some pretty heavy emotions after surviving, and maybe doesn't always think like an authoritarian ass. Plus, it's a bit off to judge somebody who's just been injured with a load of buckshot.

Here are some quotes from her previous account of that night, which raised a few eyebrows at the time:

I was saved by natural selection, and tear gas...

... My parents always taught me, as an itty-bitty child, that when your body senses danger, you go into “fight or flight” mode. It’s this basic part of your system called “adrenaline”. In a split second, I was able to see that there was no fighting a dude in what appeared to be full combat gear, so I ran. I hope to not offend anybody by saying this, but I wasn’t touched by an angel, I wasn’t “blessed”- I had a good head on my shoulders and I used it. It actually worries and saddens me that most people do not possess such basic animalistic survival instincts, that so many of them curled up on the floor and kissed their own butts goodbye....

“Fight or flight” is an extremely basic human survival instinct to me, but apparently it wasn’t to some of the others in the theater that night because there were only a couple of other people running with us, I believe. I wasn’t even thinking about this at the time, though, so this is all just in retrospect. The thought did cross my mind that there might be another guy at the exit/entrance, but I knew that regardless, we needed to keep moving. It’s hard to hit a moving target anyway, and I wasn’t sure if it was gunshots or fireworks that I heard behind me.

...If my partner and I had not taken responsibility for ourselves at some point in our lives and joined the US Navy, we would not have immediately recognized the smell of tear gas. If we had not been so sharp, or just born with common sense and basic survival instincts, we would not have ran. If we were lazy and slow, we would not have ran as fast as we did (glad we go on those nightly dog walks). If we were not brave, we would not have kept moving even though someone very well could have been blocking the exit, with another gun
http://sinisterdreams.wordpress.com/201 ... continued/

The pretty clear implication, intended or not, is that those who died (including her own naval colleagues?) were not as brave, un-lazy, smart, quick-thinking, etc. as she is, and that they didn't have the requisite survival instincts, or take responsibility for themselves in the necessary way (by joining the navy?). Which is a pretty shitty way of looking at it.

The full account is an interesting and worthwhile read though.

This image of the slothful surrendering victims has become a bit of a meme among some sections of the asshole community - remember that NaturalNews guy's blog: "Why Didn't They Fight Back?" He kept going on about how if he had been there he would've just cartwheeled over to the shooter and used his Krav Maga training to disarm him. It takes quite an unusual class of prick to say something like that, I reckon.

The shotgun has been mentioned a few times in the thread btw.

[AhabsOtherLeg]

Simply depressing the trigger and making a general "swathing" motion will lay up an effectively solid wall of flesh-piercing, organ-grinding death, and that wall is formed entirely of projectiles capable of flying clear through a cheap ANSI Chinese drywall barrier and the (very minimal) soundproofing of your average multiplex strip mall building.

And through the seats as well. They would provide no cover whatsoever. So if you couldn't immediately leave the row you were sitting in and run out of the auditorium (because the seating rows would still be packed with other people, just beginning to panic) your best bet really would be lying flat on the floor between the seats and hoping against hope. And of course if you do that then the other people in their terror will run over the top of you and crush you. There would've been no way out for most of them even if they did react instantly, and the odds of approaching a man with an automatic weapon from the front to disarm him through stinging gas and darkness while you are still reacting to the shock of his first attack... it just wouldn't happen.

[Hammer of Los]

...

So do we have a list of firearms used in the attack at all?

Shotguns?

Automatic rifles?

Were there handgun wounds at all?

...