4 ms·

No. There is no fucking way anyone can consider swatting a prank. The one mischaracterizing the intent here is you.

• pyre 11y ago
  I'd say that the people doing it (and that enjoy watching it happen) are trying to downplay it (to themselves as well as others) by calling it a "prank." It toes the line of actually ordering a hit on someone. The intent is obviously not to kill the target, but I also doubt that the perpetrators would feel any remorse if it ended up in a death (they would rationalize it away as the police's fault, not their own). It's classification as a prank by the (teenager, gamer, 4chan, etc) culture that encourages this isn't helped by the fact that this is just an escalation of other "use a phone call to rain disorder onto someone's life" pranks: * Placing large pizza delivery orders for the target. * For a while you could order free boxes off of the USPS website, and I remember it being a thing where people would get a group to order a ton of boxes and send them to someone. Many people from that sub-culture see swatting as basically the "nuclear weapon" of those types of revenge "pranks." I can't say that I've personally witnessed the escalation to SWAT'ing, but it seems to be people from that sub-culture/mindset that see SWAT'ing as a funny joke to throw at someone that annoys them.
• omginternets 11y ago
  Then what on earth is the intent?
  • krapp 11y ago
    Attempted murder? Why else would you send a paramilitary force to someone's home, if not to hope they get shot?
    • omginternets 11y ago
      We can call it that too, but it's still still very strange to suggest that we should ignore the motive. The motive is clearly to have a laugh at someone's expense. Where I come from, that's qualified as a prank, and does not preclude the act from also being attempted murder. The extent to which everybody wants to play with words wrt this issue is puzzling.