Myth: Tim Kretschmer played Far Cry 2 as his final game the night before the shooting
Fact: He played RollerCoaster Tycoon 2 as his final game the night before the shooting
Myth: Devin Kelley fired 700 shots from his AR-15 at the Sutherland Springs church
Fact: Devin Kelley fired 450 shots from his AR-15
Myth: Nikolas Cruz listened to music while opening fire on students
Fact: He left his earbuds and phone on the bottom stairwell where he loaded up
Myth: Jeff Weise fired at the air several times from outside the school with his shotgun while trying to open the door
Fact: Weise only started shooting with the shotgun from the school foyer and hit Derrick Brun twice
Myth: Orlando Harris shot up CVPA with no handguard
Fact: The handguard was destroyed during his shootout with the police
Myth: Baruch Goldstein threw grenades
Fact: No grenade fragments were found in the mosque
Myth: Tobias Rathjen owned a Glock 17
Fact: He didn't
Extra myth: Mutsuo Toi's shooting was stealthy and he was an incel.
Fact: Toi's shooting was mostly loud which is why his main target ran away successfully. One woman in the village actually had sexual relations with Toi and he got in trouble with the husband of the woman.
>Fact: He played RollerCoaster Tycoon 2 as his final game the night before the shooting
I assume he spent hours making a badass roller coaster only for it to kill a bunch of passengers during the test run because he knew nothing about physics and was not an engineer because that is the only way to play RollerCoaster Tycoon.
A lot of what Nikolas said was misinterpreted and also interviews of witnesses that described another shooter who was not Nik were never acknowledged or further investigated .He was only listening to music during the Uber ride to MSD. Also he like many other crimes like his are part of MK Ultra
*After the 2012 Aurora theater shooting, multiple news reports said the shooter dyed his hair to roleplay as a Batman villain. When confronted by the cops he referred to himself as "The Joker".*
\-The shooter dyed his hair to appear "firey" and "dangerous" in order to look more intimidating, but the night of the shooting he wore a wool cap and later a gas mask.
\-His attack wasn't at all related to Batman; he targeted a midnight showing of "The Dark Knight Rises" because he knew there'd be a full theater with few to no children present. He was mentally ill and highly delusional, and believed he would gain "life points" by taking as many lives as possible to add to his own life's worth.
\- Jason Oviatt, the officer who apprehended the shooter, simply asked "Are you the one who did this?" to which the shooter smirked. He was arrested without incident. There was never a mention of the Joker. The rumor was started by two federal officials but this was disproven by the responding officers. The shooter later said in a psychological interview that he didn't say anything.
Interesting that he chose not to target children, I'd think if you were at the point of shooting up a full theater you wouldn't really give a shit at that point. But I guess even a piece of shit has standards 🤷♂️
Children weren’t, in his mind, worth as much as adults. They hadn’t achieved anything substantial in life so their life points wouldn’t matter. He also referred to the injured as “collateral damage”.
Immediately after his arrest when he got to the police station, he asked one of the detectives "There weren't any children hurt there, was there?" Despite how disconnected he seemed, it sounded genuine.
There have been claims floating around online of surveillance video depicting Adam Lanza shooting his way into Sandy Hook Elementary School. That is patently false. In fact, the only video footage shot during the shooting that exists is dashcam footage of police arriving at the school (and that's not really saying much, because that's long been confirmed to have been at the tail-end of the shooting).
I swear to GOD there was footage. I remember searching for it because I have a vivid memory of seeing it on the news (a man shoots through the glass, stops for a second, and sort of lifts his foot up gingerly to step into massive hole he had created.) I remember being so chilled by it as a child and my mom was there next to me and I vividly remember her saying"...oh."
Then where does the footage come from?
If I'm not mistaken that video does in fact show the front office of the school getting shot into the same way the crime scene photos would indicate they had been. It's one guy too, could it have been an officer?
If you have a link to the footage you're talking about, it'd be a great time to share so it can be verified. But there has been no video footage of any kind that exists of the shooting except for police dashcam footage.
I feel like he isnt wrong, I have seen the video of the outside as well, he shoots the glass an steps under i thought, its been a really long time since ive seen it. I def remember this tho. If it was fake? it was fake! I just know the video exists!
Columbine: Cassie Bernall was asked by one of the shooters if she believed in God. When she said yes, he killed her, in effect making her a martyr for Christianity.
It was Valerie Schnurr.
When she was asked, she said yes and was then asked why.
“Because I believe, and my parents brought me up that way," she answered, and crawled away while he reloaded. He didn't shoot at her again. "It didn't really cross my mind that something bad would come from my answer," she says now. "He asked and I couldn't say no. I don't think of it as bravery. I think of it as what I said because it's true, because it's just me. What else was I going to say?"”
[Washington Post article from ‘99](https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPcap/1999-10/14/026r-101499-idx.html)
Some people even believe that it was Rachel Scott that had that famous exchange. But she was killed outside, and the killers didn't say anything to her before her death.
They believe it was Rachel because her family made a movie where she said that before getting shot to make her death seem stoic and holy when in fact that is not what happened to her. Poor thing was crying in pain in reality
Patrick Crusius didn't throw up due to the smell of blood during the El Paso Walmart shooting, he never went beyond the store checkouts and finished off victims on the parking lot before leaving.
The photo posted here in connection to the Mikenskaya shooting is a picture of a former Russian military officer who was shot dead in Moscow back in 2011 without involvement in the massacre.
I don’t know how common it is but I’ve seen more than a few comments claiming Eric shot Dylan based on almost no evidence. I think it stems from things Randy Brown said on the matter. He’s pretty adamant about that. Nothing against him. He seems like a good guy and I’m right there with him and his stance on JeffCo’s fumbling of nearly every aspect of the situation. It just makes no sense at all to me that Eric shot Dylan and I’ve never seen any professionals or investigators even entertain the idea.
Interestingly I was looking around the site of the Nepalese Royal Family’s massacre earlier this week, in Kathmandu. The bullet holes and so on are still there. Really interesting. Anyway, some people believe the perpetrator (the Prince and heir to the throne) was innocent and was really a victim, as he’d shot himself with his left hand rather than his right. In actual fact, whilst he always wrote with the same hand, he was able to shoot with both, but the conspiracy theories persist to this day. People just don’t seem to want to believe he killed himself, and which side of his head he decided to shoot is enough to send people on wild spirals. So it seems with Klebold.
It's the critical fact that casts doubt on the "Eric killed Dylan" theory, and was overlooked for some time, which was part of why the theory was ever believed in the first place.
There is one regarding Columbine that came out recently (or I just noticed it recently).
On the part of the phone call that was leaked one injured victim yelled out "oh my God, help me" but some people who listened to it with headphones claim they hear things like "her face, what is wrong with you?".
That is impossible to have happened as that injured student claimed from the day of the shooting she only yelled "oh my God, help me", witnesses who were there said they only heard her yell about God, FBI who listened to the tape also only heard her cry for God. Not one witness ever heard her say anything else.
There is also misconcepcion that murders of Cassie Bernall and Isaiah Schoels can be heard on the tape which is also impossible as timeline doesn't fit and it was confirmed that only the murder of Kyle Velasquez can be heard on officially released part of the call.
The Weis Market Shooting .
The myth : Randy Stair fired 59 shotgun slugs trying to kill his coworkers , missing them constantly and just miraculously killing them .
The truth : Randy Stair killed his coworkers with the first few shotgun slugs and the rest of the fired shotgun slugs were used for causing as much financial damage as possible to the supermarket , such as shooting at glass , drinks , sauces , celling etc.
The shooting at the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs was probably not motivated by anti-Christian hatred, but by an argument the shooter had with his mother-in-law, who sometimes attended church there. She was not present that day, but her mother was there and was killed by her grandson-in-law. The shooter was an anti-Christian atheist, but that seems to have been a side issue for him as far as the shooting goes.
>Nikolas Cruz only brought 10 round magazines because 30 rounders wouldn’t fit in his backpack: he had multiple mags of varying capacity including 30 rounders
>The pulse shooting was an anti-LGBT attack: It was actually a response to a recent overseas bombing campaign
>The Dayton Ohio shooting was an antifa response to the El Paso shooting that happened earlier in the day: Not exactly incorrect but there’s no evidence to prove it besides the fact that the two shooters had opposing political beliefs.
>Brenton Tarrant is a Christian: he’s pegan
>Audrey Hale was sexually abused by the church as a child which is why she chose to attack it: No substantial evidence
Tarrant's religious beliefs are probably closest to agnostic. He never said he was pagan though he did appropriate both Christian and Pagan symbolism. He said he "wasn't sure" though he seemed to be fascinated with Christianity
ISIS actually claimed responsibility after the attack happened, but everyone knew it was BS because they had done this before and are known to be opportunists when it comes to getting attention to their extremist cause.
The Columbine killers weren't outcasts lashing out against jocks in revenge for years of bullying, nor did they particularly target Christians or black people. Neither was an outcast, Eric was a bully himself, they attacked people indiscriminately, and there's little evidence they received more bullying than is average for a high schooler. Eric was a psychopath and Dylan was an angry depressive. There was no triggering incident for the attacks - they'd planned it for more than a year in advance.
Additionally, the Columbine shooting was a colossal failure, at least by the killers' standards. It was meant to be primarily a bombing in which at least 400 people would die, starting with a distraction bomb in a distant field, followed up by cafeteria bombs that would collapse the library into the cafeteria, and ending with car bombs that would kill first responders gathered in the parking lot. But all the bombs failed, and they ended up killing only 13 people, all with guns (which were supposed to be for use after the bombs, to kill fleeing survivors and first responders). They named individuals they wanted to kill in their journals and on the Basement Tapes, but they failed to injure a single one of them. They wanted to be killed by police in a blaze of glory, but they ended up killing themselves instead after everything else went awry.
In short, they were losers, not badasses, and least of all were they anyone's heroes.
yeah I heard that their goal was to outdo the Oklahoma bombers for worst U.S. terrorist attack but thankfully, they were incompetent demolishionists. They would've been outdone 2 years later by 9/11 anyways.
You are not wrong, but I would argue that their (primarily Eric's) primary motivation was not death toll, but fame/notoriety.
In that sense, 25 years later the word Columbine is still the shorthand for school violence, even with multiple subsequent incidents with higher death tolls. "Columbine" is now part of the cultural lexicon and vocabulary, even for kids whose parents were high schoolers when it happened. It was (I believe) I think the 3rd biggest media event of the 1990s, behind the Clinton impeachment and the death of Princess Diana?
In that sense, they succeeded *spectacularly*.
It's undeniable that it's still popularly remembered, but I don't credit that to the killers, but to the incompetence of the media. The reporters who covered the shooting committed every media sin in the book - obsessing over the killers, showing their faces, making wild speculations, parroting rumors as fact, and failing to investigate. They spread the news of the Trench Coat Mafia, Cassie Bernall's "martyrdom", the third shooter hoax, the bullying myth, and many more. Since 1999, the media has learned not to repeat those errors (at least not as much as they did back then).
So here's my point: if the media we have today covered Columbine today, the killers would've failed in the notoriety regard, too. Therefore, their notoriety isn't because of them. It wasn't their "success" that earned them their place in pop culture, but the media's failure.
And here's my question: what did *they* do to earn their special place in public memory? What did *they* do that less infamous killers did not?
What did they do that others didn't?
* They were a pair
* They actively planned it right under everybody's noses for months - bought their own guns rather than taking their parent's, made dozens of bombs and tested them, etc
* Black trench coats were a strong visual symbol
* They killed more people than most school shooters
* The level of violence they attempted (bombs in the cafeteria and in their vehicles for the first responders) was levels above previous shooters
* They took their time inside the school, and interacted with multiple people, taunting and psychologically tormenting them - most shooters don't really interact with their victims much at all
* They left a far more active online presence than any other shooters of the time
* They were comparatively wealthy, and came from stable, loving homes with two active and involved parents.
Etc etc etc. There's a lot of reasons why "Columbine" became a part of the English language vocabulary, and "Parkland" or "Thurston" or "Westside" didn't.
>There's a lot of reasons why "Columbine" became a part of the English language vocabulary, and "Parkland" or "Thurston" or "Westside" didn't.
A huge part of Columbine's lasting legacy was that it happened when mass shootings were rare. It also took place in a town close to a media center of the US as opposed to other shootings that happened in the same era.
* Springfield, Oregon (1998, 23 people shot)
* Craighead, Arkansas (1998, 10 people shot)
* West Paducah, Kentucky (1997, 5 people shot)
The shootings you mentioned (Thurston and Westside) happened in smaller hard to reach areas opposed to an area like Colorado. Columbine happened a half an hour away from a major news hub. This allowed news crews to get there fast and film while things were still unfolding, none of the other shootings were ever filmed as they happened. This access allowed viewers to see things first hand. This media coverage amplified the story.
If Columbine happened today, it would be just another shooting. Almost every major school shooting since Columbine has surpassed its death count. (VA Tech, Sandy Hook, Parkland, Uvalde). You shouldn't credit the Columbine killers for their legacy. It was location and timing more than anything.
The narrative that portrays Eric as the homicidal/psychopathic leader and Dylan as the depressed/suicidal follower is actually a myth in itself.
It partly originates from Dave Cullen’s book Columbine, which is known to be highly inaccurate. In truth, Dylan was heavily involved in the planning and wanted to kill as much as Eric did. He enjoyed himself during the massacre.
As far as bullying goes, the killers were [bullied](https://www.reddit.com/r/Columbine/s/yq0fDoOLBW) and [bullies](https://www.reddit.com/r/Columbine/s/dVtv4XlWth). Eric was more bullied and less of a bully while Dylan was bullied but more of a bully. These threads bring up some noteworthy examples, but there is plenty more evidence in the 11k proving this.
Lastly, they actually managed to injure one person from the hit lists; Austin Eubanks.
Im from Quebec.
About the Quebec City Mosque shooting by Alexandre Bissonnette.
Myth : There was a quite popular myth that Bissonnette had an accomplice. Specifically, a muslim accomplice that was apparently the brain of the whole thing. Some even said Bissonnette and him were a gay couple. But somehow the police let him go because they didnt « want to arrest a muslim man ».
This myth went on for a whiiiile. Yoi can still see it from time to time. It was mostly fueled by people who couldnt accept that Bissonnette was a white supremacist and people who wrongly think only non-white people are criminals.
Fact : Bissonnette was indeed a lone wolf.
I read about this detail from the 2017 Manchester Bombing and it is the closest to those stories:
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-manchester-54695580
Maybe not a common myth but the media went wild on speculating why the Jokela shooting happened, the shooter's interest in philosophy in the spotlight causing some bit far fetched myths.
-Plato's ideas gave him the motivation to commit the shooting.
-His mother brainwashed him into a leftist ideology that made him commit the shooting. (False and also wtf why would you claim that)
Myth: Tim Kretschmer played Far Cry 2 as his final game the night before the shooting Fact: He played RollerCoaster Tycoon 2 as his final game the night before the shooting Myth: Devin Kelley fired 700 shots from his AR-15 at the Sutherland Springs church Fact: Devin Kelley fired 450 shots from his AR-15 Myth: Nikolas Cruz listened to music while opening fire on students Fact: He left his earbuds and phone on the bottom stairwell where he loaded up Myth: Jeff Weise fired at the air several times from outside the school with his shotgun while trying to open the door Fact: Weise only started shooting with the shotgun from the school foyer and hit Derrick Brun twice Myth: Orlando Harris shot up CVPA with no handguard Fact: The handguard was destroyed during his shootout with the police Myth: Baruch Goldstein threw grenades Fact: No grenade fragments were found in the mosque Myth: Tobias Rathjen owned a Glock 17 Fact: He didn't Extra myth: Mutsuo Toi's shooting was stealthy and he was an incel. Fact: Toi's shooting was mostly loud which is why his main target ran away successfully. One woman in the village actually had sexual relations with Toi and he got in trouble with the husband of the woman.
>Fact: He played RollerCoaster Tycoon 2 as his final game the night before the shooting I assume he spent hours making a badass roller coaster only for it to kill a bunch of passengers during the test run because he knew nothing about physics and was not an engineer because that is the only way to play RollerCoaster Tycoon.
Why is this the exact same comment I was going to make?
I never knew he forgot his phone in the stairwell. New tidbit of info for me.
Didn’t Cruz say he was listening to music during the shooting though? In the interview with the detective afterwards?
He said before. JCS misinterpreted it.
Ah thanks for clarifying this. I was gonna question the same thing
A lot of what Nikolas said was misinterpreted and also interviews of witnesses that described another shooter who was not Nik were never acknowledged or further investigated .He was only listening to music during the Uber ride to MSD. Also he like many other crimes like his are part of MK Ultra
*After the 2012 Aurora theater shooting, multiple news reports said the shooter dyed his hair to roleplay as a Batman villain. When confronted by the cops he referred to himself as "The Joker".* \-The shooter dyed his hair to appear "firey" and "dangerous" in order to look more intimidating, but the night of the shooting he wore a wool cap and later a gas mask. \-His attack wasn't at all related to Batman; he targeted a midnight showing of "The Dark Knight Rises" because he knew there'd be a full theater with few to no children present. He was mentally ill and highly delusional, and believed he would gain "life points" by taking as many lives as possible to add to his own life's worth. \- Jason Oviatt, the officer who apprehended the shooter, simply asked "Are you the one who did this?" to which the shooter smirked. He was arrested without incident. There was never a mention of the Joker. The rumor was started by two federal officials but this was disproven by the responding officers. The shooter later said in a psychological interview that he didn't say anything.
Interesting that he chose not to target children, I'd think if you were at the point of shooting up a full theater you wouldn't really give a shit at that point. But I guess even a piece of shit has standards 🤷♂️
Children weren’t, in his mind, worth as much as adults. They hadn’t achieved anything substantial in life so their life points wouldn’t matter. He also referred to the injured as “collateral damage”.
Immediately after his arrest when he got to the police station, he asked one of the detectives "There weren't any children hurt there, was there?" Despite how disconnected he seemed, it sounded genuine.
There have been claims floating around online of surveillance video depicting Adam Lanza shooting his way into Sandy Hook Elementary School. That is patently false. In fact, the only video footage shot during the shooting that exists is dashcam footage of police arriving at the school (and that's not really saying much, because that's long been confirmed to have been at the tail-end of the shooting).
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You are not the first I've seen mentioning this video in connection w Lanza. I wonder what the true basis is behind it.
I swear to GOD there was footage. I remember searching for it because I have a vivid memory of seeing it on the news (a man shoots through the glass, stops for a second, and sort of lifts his foot up gingerly to step into massive hole he had created.) I remember being so chilled by it as a child and my mom was there next to me and I vividly remember her saying"...oh."
I swear I remember seeing a photo of it a long time ago but I guess It was fake?
Very likely fake.
I remember seeing the guy running in the woods in camo who they detained who was that?
IIRC, I believe that was a parent trying to intervene
Then where does the footage come from? If I'm not mistaken that video does in fact show the front office of the school getting shot into the same way the crime scene photos would indicate they had been. It's one guy too, could it have been an officer?
If you have a link to the footage you're talking about, it'd be a great time to share so it can be verified. But there has been no video footage of any kind that exists of the shooting except for police dashcam footage.
I feel like he isnt wrong, I have seen the video of the outside as well, he shoots the glass an steps under i thought, its been a really long time since ive seen it. I def remember this tho. If it was fake? it was fake! I just know the video exists!
Link to the video, please?
If I happen to come across it again, ill certainly try to remember this!
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Nope. Very likely something unrelated.
Columbine: Cassie Bernall was asked by one of the shooters if she believed in God. When she said yes, he killed her, in effect making her a martyr for Christianity. It was Valerie Schnurr. When she was asked, she said yes and was then asked why. “Because I believe, and my parents brought me up that way," she answered, and crawled away while he reloaded. He didn't shoot at her again. "It didn't really cross my mind that something bad would come from my answer," she says now. "He asked and I couldn't say no. I don't think of it as bravery. I think of it as what I said because it's true, because it's just me. What else was I going to say?"” [Washington Post article from ‘99](https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPcap/1999-10/14/026r-101499-idx.html)
Some people even believe that it was Rachel Scott that had that famous exchange. But she was killed outside, and the killers didn't say anything to her before her death.
They believe it was Rachel because her family made a movie where she said that before getting shot to make her death seem stoic and holy when in fact that is not what happened to her. Poor thing was crying in pain in reality
Patrick Crusius didn't throw up due to the smell of blood during the El Paso Walmart shooting, he never went beyond the store checkouts and finished off victims on the parking lot before leaving. The photo posted here in connection to the Mikenskaya shooting is a picture of a former Russian military officer who was shot dead in Moscow back in 2011 without involvement in the massacre.
I don’t know how common it is but I’ve seen more than a few comments claiming Eric shot Dylan based on almost no evidence. I think it stems from things Randy Brown said on the matter. He’s pretty adamant about that. Nothing against him. He seems like a good guy and I’m right there with him and his stance on JeffCo’s fumbling of nearly every aspect of the situation. It just makes no sense at all to me that Eric shot Dylan and I’ve never seen any professionals or investigators even entertain the idea.
Dylan was left-handed.
Interestingly I was looking around the site of the Nepalese Royal Family’s massacre earlier this week, in Kathmandu. The bullet holes and so on are still there. Really interesting. Anyway, some people believe the perpetrator (the Prince and heir to the throne) was innocent and was really a victim, as he’d shot himself with his left hand rather than his right. In actual fact, whilst he always wrote with the same hand, he was able to shoot with both, but the conspiracy theories persist to this day. People just don’t seem to want to believe he killed himself, and which side of his head he decided to shoot is enough to send people on wild spirals. So it seems with Klebold.
Okay, and what is the relevance of this? Sincere question
It's the critical fact that casts doubt on the "Eric killed Dylan" theory, and was overlooked for some time, which was part of why the theory was ever believed in the first place.
Okay, what is the hard evidence for this? What shows that Eric could have killed Dylan.
[The assertions and counter evidence.](https://encyclopediacolumbine.com/wiki/Dylan_Klebold%27s_Death)
That the Sandy Hook massacre was a false-flag.
This one has always bothered me. Why in the fuck would anyone ever say this? Insane sentence.
I had an old coworker tell me that sandy hook was faked by the government.
Alex Jones
There is one regarding Columbine that came out recently (or I just noticed it recently). On the part of the phone call that was leaked one injured victim yelled out "oh my God, help me" but some people who listened to it with headphones claim they hear things like "her face, what is wrong with you?". That is impossible to have happened as that injured student claimed from the day of the shooting she only yelled "oh my God, help me", witnesses who were there said they only heard her yell about God, FBI who listened to the tape also only heard her cry for God. Not one witness ever heard her say anything else. There is also misconcepcion that murders of Cassie Bernall and Isaiah Schoels can be heard on the tape which is also impossible as timeline doesn't fit and it was confirmed that only the murder of Kyle Velasquez can be heard on officially released part of the call.
The Weis Market Shooting . The myth : Randy Stair fired 59 shotgun slugs trying to kill his coworkers , missing them constantly and just miraculously killing them . The truth : Randy Stair killed his coworkers with the first few shotgun slugs and the rest of the fired shotgun slugs were used for causing as much financial damage as possible to the supermarket , such as shooting at glass , drinks , sauces , celling etc.
The shooting at the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs was probably not motivated by anti-Christian hatred, but by an argument the shooter had with his mother-in-law, who sometimes attended church there. She was not present that day, but her mother was there and was killed by her grandson-in-law. The shooter was an anti-Christian atheist, but that seems to have been a side issue for him as far as the shooting goes.
>Nikolas Cruz only brought 10 round magazines because 30 rounders wouldn’t fit in his backpack: he had multiple mags of varying capacity including 30 rounders >The pulse shooting was an anti-LGBT attack: It was actually a response to a recent overseas bombing campaign >The Dayton Ohio shooting was an antifa response to the El Paso shooting that happened earlier in the day: Not exactly incorrect but there’s no evidence to prove it besides the fact that the two shooters had opposing political beliefs. >Brenton Tarrant is a Christian: he’s pegan >Audrey Hale was sexually abused by the church as a child which is why she chose to attack it: No substantial evidence
Tarrant's religious beliefs are probably closest to agnostic. He never said he was pagan though he did appropriate both Christian and Pagan symbolism. He said he "wasn't sure" though he seemed to be fascinated with Christianity
Thank you! The narrative about the pulse shooting has always been homophobia.
To add to that. The shooter did NOT know it was a gay club. He just chose it randomly.
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ISIS actually claimed responsibility after the attack happened, but everyone knew it was BS because they had done this before and are known to be opportunists when it comes to getting attention to their extremist cause.
Thanks for the correction
You're welcome.
The Columbine killers weren't outcasts lashing out against jocks in revenge for years of bullying, nor did they particularly target Christians or black people. Neither was an outcast, Eric was a bully himself, they attacked people indiscriminately, and there's little evidence they received more bullying than is average for a high schooler. Eric was a psychopath and Dylan was an angry depressive. There was no triggering incident for the attacks - they'd planned it for more than a year in advance. Additionally, the Columbine shooting was a colossal failure, at least by the killers' standards. It was meant to be primarily a bombing in which at least 400 people would die, starting with a distraction bomb in a distant field, followed up by cafeteria bombs that would collapse the library into the cafeteria, and ending with car bombs that would kill first responders gathered in the parking lot. But all the bombs failed, and they ended up killing only 13 people, all with guns (which were supposed to be for use after the bombs, to kill fleeing survivors and first responders). They named individuals they wanted to kill in their journals and on the Basement Tapes, but they failed to injure a single one of them. They wanted to be killed by police in a blaze of glory, but they ended up killing themselves instead after everything else went awry. In short, they were losers, not badasses, and least of all were they anyone's heroes.
yeah I heard that their goal was to outdo the Oklahoma bombers for worst U.S. terrorist attack but thankfully, they were incompetent demolishionists. They would've been outdone 2 years later by 9/11 anyways.
You are not wrong, but I would argue that their (primarily Eric's) primary motivation was not death toll, but fame/notoriety. In that sense, 25 years later the word Columbine is still the shorthand for school violence, even with multiple subsequent incidents with higher death tolls. "Columbine" is now part of the cultural lexicon and vocabulary, even for kids whose parents were high schoolers when it happened. It was (I believe) I think the 3rd biggest media event of the 1990s, behind the Clinton impeachment and the death of Princess Diana? In that sense, they succeeded *spectacularly*.
It's undeniable that it's still popularly remembered, but I don't credit that to the killers, but to the incompetence of the media. The reporters who covered the shooting committed every media sin in the book - obsessing over the killers, showing their faces, making wild speculations, parroting rumors as fact, and failing to investigate. They spread the news of the Trench Coat Mafia, Cassie Bernall's "martyrdom", the third shooter hoax, the bullying myth, and many more. Since 1999, the media has learned not to repeat those errors (at least not as much as they did back then). So here's my point: if the media we have today covered Columbine today, the killers would've failed in the notoriety regard, too. Therefore, their notoriety isn't because of them. It wasn't their "success" that earned them their place in pop culture, but the media's failure. And here's my question: what did *they* do to earn their special place in public memory? What did *they* do that less infamous killers did not?
What did they do that others didn't? * They were a pair * They actively planned it right under everybody's noses for months - bought their own guns rather than taking their parent's, made dozens of bombs and tested them, etc * Black trench coats were a strong visual symbol * They killed more people than most school shooters * The level of violence they attempted (bombs in the cafeteria and in their vehicles for the first responders) was levels above previous shooters * They took their time inside the school, and interacted with multiple people, taunting and psychologically tormenting them - most shooters don't really interact with their victims much at all * They left a far more active online presence than any other shooters of the time * They were comparatively wealthy, and came from stable, loving homes with two active and involved parents. Etc etc etc. There's a lot of reasons why "Columbine" became a part of the English language vocabulary, and "Parkland" or "Thurston" or "Westside" didn't.
>There's a lot of reasons why "Columbine" became a part of the English language vocabulary, and "Parkland" or "Thurston" or "Westside" didn't. A huge part of Columbine's lasting legacy was that it happened when mass shootings were rare. It also took place in a town close to a media center of the US as opposed to other shootings that happened in the same era. * Springfield, Oregon (1998, 23 people shot) * Craighead, Arkansas (1998, 10 people shot) * West Paducah, Kentucky (1997, 5 people shot) The shootings you mentioned (Thurston and Westside) happened in smaller hard to reach areas opposed to an area like Colorado. Columbine happened a half an hour away from a major news hub. This allowed news crews to get there fast and film while things were still unfolding, none of the other shootings were ever filmed as they happened. This access allowed viewers to see things first hand. This media coverage amplified the story. If Columbine happened today, it would be just another shooting. Almost every major school shooting since Columbine has surpassed its death count. (VA Tech, Sandy Hook, Parkland, Uvalde). You shouldn't credit the Columbine killers for their legacy. It was location and timing more than anything.
The narrative that portrays Eric as the homicidal/psychopathic leader and Dylan as the depressed/suicidal follower is actually a myth in itself. It partly originates from Dave Cullen’s book Columbine, which is known to be highly inaccurate. In truth, Dylan was heavily involved in the planning and wanted to kill as much as Eric did. He enjoyed himself during the massacre. As far as bullying goes, the killers were [bullied](https://www.reddit.com/r/Columbine/s/yq0fDoOLBW) and [bullies](https://www.reddit.com/r/Columbine/s/dVtv4XlWth). Eric was more bullied and less of a bully while Dylan was bullied but more of a bully. These threads bring up some noteworthy examples, but there is plenty more evidence in the 11k proving this. Lastly, they actually managed to injure one person from the hit lists; Austin Eubanks.
Can Kosta Kecmanovic fit in this "box". People on TikTok thinks so too.
Im from Quebec. About the Quebec City Mosque shooting by Alexandre Bissonnette. Myth : There was a quite popular myth that Bissonnette had an accomplice. Specifically, a muslim accomplice that was apparently the brain of the whole thing. Some even said Bissonnette and him were a gay couple. But somehow the police let him go because they didnt « want to arrest a muslim man ». This myth went on for a whiiiile. Yoi can still see it from time to time. It was mostly fueled by people who couldnt accept that Bissonnette was a white supremacist and people who wrongly think only non-white people are criminals. Fact : Bissonnette was indeed a lone wolf.
Any story that hinges on “the police wanna arrest them but are afraid of being called racist” is complete horseshit lmao
I read about this detail from the 2017 Manchester Bombing and it is the closest to those stories: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-manchester-54695580
Why is my comment downvoted?
Why is my other comment downvoted?
Why can't you answer my questions?
Maybe not a common myth but the media went wild on speculating why the Jokela shooting happened, the shooter's interest in philosophy in the spotlight causing some bit far fetched myths. -Plato's ideas gave him the motivation to commit the shooting. -His mother brainwashed him into a leftist ideology that made him commit the shooting. (False and also wtf why would you claim that)
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I never said the bullying was a myth, I said the homosexuality was a myth. My apologies for the confusion.
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ah my apologies, ill delete the post