Child killings - what's happening in China?!

[UnderAGreySky]

Another incident of child murder in China, and depending on whom you believe, the fifth, sixth or eighth one. (note: second link may be behind a pay wall and third has an auto-start video).

What the hell is going on there?

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Copy Cat Killings?

[Korgeta]

Lot of it is down to being copycat style killings, much in the same way that in the U.S (and in europe) were several schools shootings were done by people, some of them stating or showing evidence that they look to the Coloumbine High School shootings as a model to vent out their anger and gain the attention they desire. Children have much greater signficance in china due to the one child policy and that schools are generally low secure as well meaning they were targets waiting to happen. As to why as in the motive, is something I don't understand myself.

[Samuel]

If it is copycat, can the government just censor the press in order to discourage such attacks?

[mr friendly guy]

If it is copycat, can the government just censor the press in order to discourage such attacks?

They supposedly already thought of that. Press are asked to only copy what the official Xinhua news reports. Trying to prevent copy cats was the given reason.

They are also making police make more patrols as well I think train some staff to defend themselves. I saw the brief pic on CNN showing some of the training session.

[Iosef Cross]

Second to the article, it appears that the fast socio/economic change occurring in China had the side effect of causing mental problems in part of the population.

[Samuel]

Second to the article, it appears that the fast socio/economic change occurring in China had the side effect of causing mental problems in part of the population.

Yeah, but there is a difference between "people aren't taking the change well" and "people kill kids". There is almost certainly more to this as people who have a problem with "the system" tend to attack targets related to who they think is screwing them over. To the best of my knowledge, no conspiracy theory includes 5 year olds.

Of course, the article mentions that they aim for kids because they are easiest to hurt and there is laxer security, so it could just be "if I go down, I'm taking as many with me".

[weemadando]

How about zero recognition, let alone treatment of mental health issues? That's certainly a major issue.

[Korgeta]

What is china's view of mental health and how it should be treated?

[weemadando]

China's view has long been that mental health issues do not exist and that anyone suffering from them should be hidden from society and not spoken of. Hence people who develop such issues, who may already be wary of treatment for reasons stemming from their condition are even more paranoid about it.

[Edward Yee]

Yeah, but there is a difference between "people aren't taking the change well" and "people kill kids". There is almost certainly more to this as people who have a problem with "the system" tend to attack targets related to who they think is screwing them over. To the best of my knowledge, no conspiracy theory includes 5 year olds.

Of course, the article mentions that they aim for kids because they are easiest to hurt and there is laxer security, so it could just be "if I go down, I'm taking as many with me".

Another angle I've heard in the NYT was that it was targeting children to cause problems for those in power. The rationale being that it would be on top of existing PR scandals such as the Sanlu contaminated milk scandal. First "the government" not being able to prevent kids from being poisoned, then "the government" not being able to prevent kids from getting hacked up...

In one of the recent cases, there was an existing dispute over (in the killer's mind at least) rent on the school building between the killer and the (slain) school administrator/teacher; apparently the killer wanted the property back, while the administrator/teacher wanted to hold off on that until summer vacation. I've also heard that the guy did have mental issues, and an adult son of his was mentally ill though.

I'm not sure if weemadando's view is correct -- it's more like it's officially acknowledged, but that the legitimacy of treatment (hence hesitation) is called into question when mentally-ill facilities are used to detain political dissidents or petitioners trying to "go above" corrupt village officials (who plant agents the capital to stop the whistleblowing)...

[weemadando]

I'm just going on what I've been told from Chinese immigrants and those who have worked in China. That is, that families hide away any disabled/mentally ill family members for life. Alternately, they dump them into state care, which is usually no more than a very bad gaol - certainly not any kind of treatment facility.

[Samuel]

In one of the recent cases, there was an existing dispute over (in the killer's mind at least) rent on the school building between the killer and the (slain) school administrator/teacher; apparently the killer wanted the property back, while the administrator/teacher wanted to hold off on that until summer vacation. I've also heard that the guy did have mental issues, and an adult son of his was mentally ill though.

We had a case like that in the US a long time ago (Bath School disaster). Although it ended with the nut bombing the school instead of hacking people to death.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

These things happen all the damn time. THere was.. an incident I forgot where in Europe. Some nutcase guy went to a children's creche and went round stabbing. So I'm a bit hard pressed to be utterly surprised by this incident.

And China's own propensity to turn a blind eye on plenty of things of course doesn't help.

[jcow79]

The U.S. had that guy that went into that Amish school several years back and started executing kids. So this sort of thing does happen all over. But the sheer amount of copy cats in the China cases is mind boggling.

[[R_H]]

These things happen all the damn time. THere was.. an incident I forgot where in Europe. Some nutcase guy went to a children's creche and went round stabbing. So I'm a bit hard pressed to be utterly surprised by this incident.

And China's own propensity to turn a blind eye on plenty of things of course doesn't help.

Ah yes, that guy. Didn't that happen in Belgium or the Netherlands?

[Edward Yee]

Re: media coverage -- not only is it supposed to dissuade copycats... but apparently there's some "world expo" going on, and news of government being unable to protect its weakest members when someone decides "fuck society, fuck everything!" would be *ahem* off-message...

[Mayabird]

But the sheer amount of copy cats in the China cases is mind boggling.

The sheer number of people in China is mind-boggling. Couple that with a vast untreated and ignored mental health problem and bam. When you have three to five times the population, you have three to five times more people who potentially could hear news about some guy stabbing five year olds (and who knows why initially? There was a guy who shot up a nursing home in the U.S. and killed a bunch of the residents because his estranged wife worked there sometimes) and then think, "I should do that too! Where are my knives?" Shunning and no treatment means they won't be taken out of the potential pool of craziness. Nothing more complex or bizarre than that. That's what I'm thinking, anyway.