Possible Mass Shooting at Pokemon World Championships Stopped By Boston Police

[Jersey Jimmy]

So... er... this happened. If you don't want to click the link, basically a couple of guys from Iowa with a bunch of unregistered weapons drove out to Boston and were apparently going to... make themselves famous at the PWC, if you will. I don't know what their motives could possibly be (my best guess is that they're with the fundamentalist Christian "Pokemon promotes Satanism" crowd), but thankfully they were arrested. So... what do you think of this?

 

[ocelotlrama jaguar]

I'm glad they caught these two before they could actually harm anyone. I don't know what their motives were, and you know what? I don't care. They wanted to hurt and possibly kill people, and the fact that it happened at a Pokemon venue doesn't make it cool or funny. It's actually really frightening. Jesus Christ, can no one go anywhere anymore without having to fear for their lives? We have places of worship, movie theaters, and an elementary school targeted for shootings all within a span of 3 years alone. I'm just so sick of these people and the media that enables them.

 

[Chibster]

Just twisted and sick...they posted a Facebook post that can be seen this article. I had a tiny feeling something like this would happen one day after seeing so many accidents happen in places you wouldn't expect them to happen. They traveled all the way from Iowa! I'm just so glad they were caught by security and the police!

 

[Kung Fu Ferret]

Read the article after getting home from Worlds, and these two lunatics make me embarrassed to be human..

 

[King Robert]

Yet another disaster averted...why do these kind of people even exist?!

 

[Kung Fu Ferret]

To answer your question, I blame the news for giving them that stupid idea .. Unfortunately Massachusetts does not have the death penalty, but these two deserve it.

 

[Mint0]

The two suspects Kevin Norton and James Stumbo were invited to compete in the TCG Masters Division as seen on the Official site, we can rule out the fact that they were part of the anti-Pokemon crowd from this.

 

[progressforth]

This is sick, what happened to these people that would make them try to do this? I feel bad for them.

 

[Fig]

To answer your question, I blame the news for giving them that stupid idea .. Unfortunately Massachusetts does not have the death penalty, but these two deserve it.

Generally speaking, we don't condone wishing for the death of other people at Bulba (and certainly not for people who, in the end, didn't actually hurt anyone - even if they may have intended to). We'd rather avoid this kind of post in the future in this thread.

 

[glik]

WPM rightly pointed out that one of the men is known to be your typical rural gun lover and that there's no evidence to think this incident is anything more than a pair of hicks thinking big shootbangs make them sexy.

And we're all overlooking the fact that one of these dudes has a hot pink phone case.

 

[Drakon]

Truth be told, I doubt Pokémon has anything to do with the potential mass shooting. I think it was just a target of opportunity.

I would have pegged the FB photos and comments as a very tasteless joke...if they didn't bring a rifle, shotgun and a few hundred rounds of ammo with them.

 

[----]

That's terrifying, thank god they were caught in time.

 

[Osprey]

I'm just thankful that this incident will fade into obscurity within the next few days instead of making headlines. I'm thinking the motivation was no more complex than "oh hey, a large group of people, let's kill some and get famous!" Hopefully, none of us here will comprehend what made them think that murdering a bunch of Pokemon fans would make them cool.

 

[Cap'n Jack]

This was probably the weirdest thing to show up on my Facebook news feed all day. Still, it's great to read stories of crises like these being prevented before they start so we don't have another story of a "preventable tragedy".

I don't know what their motives could possibly be (my best guess is that they're with the fundamentalist Christian "Pokemon promotes Satanism" crowd), but thankfully they were arrested.

Dude, come on. There's no justifying these kinds of people. You got their motive down earlier in their post, when you euphemistically called their plan an attempt to "get famous". That's all these mass shooters want. When you kill a huge number of people all at once, it's either because you're a terrorist and these are people who live in the country you've decided to demonize, you're just plain crazy and there's something going on in your head that no one will ever understand, or like you said, they're just a couple of losers trying to be edgy and cool because they heard that the kids who shot up Columbine High School were losers like them.

To answer your question, I blame the news for giving them that stupid idea .. Unfortunately Massachusetts does not have the death penalty, but these two deserve it.

Generally speaking, we don't condone wishing for the death of other people at Bulba (and certainly not for people who, in the end, didn't actually hurt anyone - even if they may have intended to). We'd rather avoid this kind of post in the future in this thread.

He has a dissenting opinion, just get over it. I'm really getting sick of this "you can say anything you want as long as I agree with it" mentality that people have.

 

[Fig]

He has a dissenting opinion, just get over it. I'm really getting sick of this "you can say anything you want as long as I agree with it" mentality that people have.

You seem to have mistaken my post for something that was up for discussion.

 

[MurderbyDeath]

Woah! I can't believe people would do this. That's awful!

 

[Aulos]

Geez. Can't feel safe going anywhere these days. I haven't even been to my local movie theater that opened up around a year ago... I know it's bad to let terrorists rule over you, but you never know!

It's a good thing that security was on for this one.

 

[The Infidel]

Has there been any update on there motive? They don't seem Islamic based on their names and faces, they could be converts but those people usually adopt Islamic names.
Someone said "Christian fundamentalist" now I don't live in the US, but is this really a thing? Does USA really have Christian fundamentalists carrying out terror attacks too?
I doubt it's something to do with hating Pokemon as these people were actually invited to/ qualified for the Master's division. Which means they must have been pretty hardcore fans surely? I mean you don't get to the masters division by just being a casual do you?

If it's just that they want to get famous why attack your own people, if your a huge pokemon fan why would you then go and attack other huge Pokemon fans?

Also it's interesting that we're not allowed to express an opinion on the death penalty here. Thought Bulba was more open than that. Shame :/

 

[Aulos]

Someone said "Christian fundamentalist" now I don't live in the US, but is this really a thing? Does USA really have Christian fundamentalists carrying out terror attacks too?

Don't cast aside the idea. Although I'm not saying that's what happened here. It can happen, though, and has happened in abortion clinics for example.

I'm not going to rush to the idea of that being what happened here, though. Seems a bit too far off. Yes, I've heard of Christians who hate Pokemon before. I've even ran into Christians IRL who called it the devil. However, I'm not buying the idea that this had ANY religious motivation (including Islam, which I'm shocked you rushed to so quickly) without evidence.

 

[Bittersweet]

Has there been any update on there motive? They don't seem Islamic based on their names and faces, they could be converts but those people usually adopt Islamic names.
Someone said "Christian fundamentalist" now I don't live in the US, but is this really a thing? Does USA really have Christian fundamentalists carrying out terror attacks too?

.... Have you not heard of the KKK? Or cases of Christians committing violence against people who provide legal abortions?

I'm not saying this was the case, because there's not a lot to suggest it was religiously motivated, but Christian terrorism is definitely a thing.

Edit: And there's also nothing to suggest the two were Islamic at all, kind of odd you brought that up...?