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>> "An obvious joke" Not that obvious. The only thing that makes it clear this was a joke was the addition of 'jk'. A lot of people won't know when that means

>> "An obvious joke" Not that obvious. The only thing that makes it clear this was a joke was the addition of 'jk'. A lot of people won't know when that means and even though I know what it means I'd still be worried after reading the post and probably have it looked into. There are some things normal people don't even joke about - this is one of them. Edit: I might be wrong on the last point. There will be some people who joke about these types of things. But his post wasn't funny. It was just a sick statement.

Myrmornis 13y ago
Rubbish. It's perfectly normal to joke about killing kindergarten kids; it's perfectly normal to joke about all sorts of unpleasant things. Young peoples' culture and the culture of people who don't lead very sheltered lives does push the boundaries of good taste quite a bit, and that is normal.
- visarga 13y ago
  I can attest that while I was a kid, in my country (Romania), "I'm gonna kill you!" was just an emphatic variant of "I'm gonna beat you!" (which itself was not meant, just a verbal threat) and it came up quite frequently between boys under 15. They also say "Shall my mom die if what I say is not true!" just to put emphasis, short version is "My mom die, I just found something interesting!" Weird? Everyone knows not to take that literally. A variant is "I should die, look here what I found!" In the countryside there is a threat that sounds like "I'ma kill you and then do something else" (implying a beating) just as a funny way to scold a child. Almost no usage of the word "kill" in conversation is literal. It's just a way to project aggression, get attention or just joke around.
  - venomsnake 13y ago
    A little south of the border - Bulgaria. In the north parts of the country the Christmas slaughtering of a pig is called killing (without specifying the species). So a Bulgarian invites Romanian relative to come visit for the killing (mostly brutal overeating on various pig parts with few gallons of wine for drink). Some cops intercept that and mount a full force investigation, wasting money and man hours, arrest the guys etc ... then release them of course, but this would have been avoided if just the cops has asked someone from that part of the country about the jargon used.
    - tripzilch 13y ago
      Maybe they were pig cops?
      - deleted 13y ago
        [deleted]
  - freehunter 13y ago
    In the US we have a similar statement: "I swear on my mother's life that this is true". Kids even have a rhyme they sing while skipping down a sidewalk. The rules of the game are, you can't step on a crack between the stones. "Step on a crack and break your mother's back".
  - Vivtek 13y ago
    Pfft. I do that with my kids. "I'll keel you! I'll keel you until you are dead!" They giggle and run away. This is how normal people talk to their kids.
nitrogen 13y ago
There's no such thing as normal, especially when it comes to humor.
megablast 13y ago
> There are some things normal people don't even joke about - this is one of them. Is this how we should be judged by society, by what normal people joke about? Are you seriously holding that up as a point?
- tripzilch 13y ago
  > Is this how we should be judged by society, by what normal people joke about? Yes, but in the opposite way: by what normal people are free to joke about. (slightly off-topic: IMO the only way to really judge a society, is by the way it treats the very lowest/poorest/worst-off. everything comes after that. close your eyes to only a tiny fraction of the very long long tail of the very worst, and your perception gets very much skewed)
mseebach 13y ago
Obvious or not, a reasonable responses would be to send a cop around for a "friendly" chat with the kids and his parents about certain jokes not being appropriate because they'll freak too many people out. Maybe a shrink interview for CYA.
- k-mcgrady 13y ago
  I would agree with this but he's 19. At 19 you are not a kid and shouldn't need the repercussions of such a statement explained. I think this should be tried in court as a threat to kill, proved he was 'joking' and he should end up with a very, very minor punishment or some time with a psychiatrist. Edit: No reply link for me to respond the below comments so updating here. Re: psychiatrist. >> "There's no suggestion that the comments were caused by mental illness" If someone makes a statement like that and you decide it's a joke and not to punish them having a psychiatrist investigate seems sensible to me. You aren't punishing him so at least make sure he wasn't serious.
  - sillysaurus 13y ago
    I think this should be tried in court as a threat to kill You can't be serious?
    - k-mcgrady 13y ago
      That's what he did - he threatened to kill. I'm not familiar with US law so maybe there is something more appropriate he could be charged with. Edit: Based on the US freedom of speech I'm guessing written and oral threats to kill aren't an offence.
      - dalke 13y ago
        Some are, some aren't. At a sports game, when disgruntled fans yell out "kill the ref", they are not charged with a crime, much less required to pay $500,000 in bail, sent into solitary confinement, and occasionally stripped naked while waiting for trial. I believe that it is your viewpoint that any sports player or fan who says anything which can be construed as threatening to kill should be charged with a crime. Here's a specific oral threat from Shannon Sharpe of the Broncos: "we are killing the Patriots". Of course, the larger context is: "Mr. President! Call in the National Guard! Send as many men as you can spare! Because we are killing the Patriots! They need emergency help!" Should he be charged? If so, you have an extremely low threshold for free speech. If not, what makes this not a threat, while the teenager's statement is a threat?
sillysaurus 13y ago
For the record, here's exactly what the teen said: "Oh yeah, I’m real messed up in the head, I’m going to go shoot up a school full of kids and eat their still-beating hearts. Lol jk" That's an obvious joke. The "lol jk" wasn't even necessary to flag it as such.
- jlgreco 13y ago
  Seriously, eating peoples still beating hearts? I don't care about Poe's Law or how much sarcasm doesn't translate to ascii... if that is not plainly a joke to you then you have some serious issues with the english language that you need to resolve.
  - dkersten 13y ago
    I make worse jokes than this on a weekly basis. That something like this could lead to any kind of punishment beyond "stop making tasteless jokes" is insane.
    - jlgreco 13y ago
      Same. I am stunned that this apparently warrants any sort of official response, and I am doubly stunned that so many people seem to support a response of some sort.
      - deleted 13y ago
        [deleted]
- droithomme 13y ago
  Well, it's not exactly a joke, it's a comment ridiculing the other person by responding with obvious dripping sarcasm. People who really take "eat their still-beating hearts" seriously from a teenager playing a video game have serious difficulty parsing reality. However, I am skeptical that there is anyone that actually took it seriously and didn't understand that this was a sarcastic comment. Those advocating this teen's continued imprisonment while making claims he is a potential mass murderer or terrorist are not sincere, they are interested in promoting the exercise of state power for its own sake.
antihero 13y ago
We don't punish people on being funny, we punish people based on whether it's a serious, credible threat, which this clearly was not. No motive, no means, etc.
Cakez0r 13y ago
So he should be punished because firstly people couldn't infer that he was joking and secondly still couldn't infer that he was joking after he clarified that he was joking? 'jk' is really not that hard to figure out given the context. Regardless of whether people know what he means, his intent is very clear. He shouldn't be punished because some people are too stupid to interpret what he's saying or deliberately misinterpret what he's saying to get him in to trouble.
peferron 13y ago
I feel very unsafe knowing that people like you, who are able to consider seriously a scenario as inhuman as eating the still-beating hearts of children, are still out there and free to go. A normal person wouldn't ever be able to think about it as anything else than a joke. The fact that you consider it realistically possible is very disturbing. Who knows what you could do if your life hits a low point and you suddenly flip your crazy switch? If you were living next door to me, I would report you to the authorities, and hope you get jailed with $1M bail until it's made clear that you aren't a ticking bomb endangering our children.
- greedo 13y ago
  The sarcasm is strong with this one, young padawan.
GotAnyMegadeth 13y ago
> There are some things normal people don't even joke about Have you never been on the internet before?
cnwejfnwek 13y ago
No, the 'jk' isn't the only thing that makes it clear it was a joke. The phrase "still beating hearts" is an example of ridiculous over-the-top language used for the effect of humour. That's sometimes how humour works, you say something and people know it's not serious, because of how ridiculous it is. For example, if someone threatened to stab you, you might think it was a credible threat. If they threatened to sacrifice you to Kali while sodomising your pet gerbil, it's probably a joke. It's more than just "some people" who joke about dark things. I would say most people make dark or sick jokes with their friends. It's normal behaviour. I find it hard to understand why you don't already know everything I'm saying. In fact it's slightly worrying that you have such a narrow (naive even) view on how "normal" people behave, and yet you feel qualified to have an opinion on the credibility of online threats.
tripzilch 13y ago
> There are some things normal people don't even joke about - this is one of them. Those aren't normal people. At least not "normal" in the sense that you shouldn't keep a very close eye on whether you should worry about what they will do one day. I mean sure, not joking about something is everybody's choice free to make. > It was just a sick statement. It's the ones making baseless assumptions and judgements like this that I am most nervous about.

Myrmornis 13y ago

Rubbish. It's perfectly normal to joke about killing kindergarten kids; it's perfectly normal to joke about all sorts of unpleasant things. Young peoples' culture and the culture of people who don't lead very sheltered lives does push the boundaries of good taste quite a bit, and that is normal.

visarga 13y ago
I can attest that while I was a kid, in my country (Romania), "I'm gonna kill you!" was just an emphatic variant of "I'm gonna beat you!" (which itself was not meant, just a verbal threat) and it came up quite frequently between boys under 15. They also say "Shall my mom die if what I say is not true!" just to put emphasis, short version is "My mom die, I just found something interesting!" Weird? Everyone knows not to take that literally. A variant is "I should die, look here what I found!" In the countryside there is a threat that sounds like "I'ma kill you and then do something else" (implying a beating) just as a funny way to scold a child. Almost no usage of the word "kill" in conversation is literal. It's just a way to project aggression, get attention or just joke around.
- venomsnake 13y ago
  A little south of the border - Bulgaria. In the north parts of the country the Christmas slaughtering of a pig is called killing (without specifying the species). So a Bulgarian invites Romanian relative to come visit for the killing (mostly brutal overeating on various pig parts with few gallons of wine for drink). Some cops intercept that and mount a full force investigation, wasting money and man hours, arrest the guys etc ... then release them of course, but this would have been avoided if just the cops has asked someone from that part of the country about the jargon used.
  - tripzilch 13y ago
    Maybe they were pig cops?
    - deleted 13y ago
      [deleted]
- freehunter 13y ago
  In the US we have a similar statement: "I swear on my mother's life that this is true". Kids even have a rhyme they sing while skipping down a sidewalk. The rules of the game are, you can't step on a crack between the stones. "Step on a crack and break your mother's back".
- Vivtek 13y ago
  Pfft. I do that with my kids. "I'll keel you! I'll keel you until you are dead!" They giggle and run away. This is how normal people talk to their kids.

nitrogen 13y ago

There's no such thing as normal, especially when it comes to humor.

megablast 13y ago

> There are some things normal people don't even joke about - this is one of them. Is this how we should be judged by society, by what normal people joke about? Are you seriously holding that up as a point?

tripzilch 13y ago
> Is this how we should be judged by society, by what normal people joke about? Yes, but in the opposite way: by what normal people are free to joke about. (slightly off-topic: IMO the only way to really judge a society, is by the way it treats the very lowest/poorest/worst-off. everything comes after that. close your eyes to only a tiny fraction of the very long long tail of the very worst, and your perception gets very much skewed)

mseebach 13y ago

Obvious or not, a reasonable responses would be to send a cop around for a "friendly" chat with the kids and his parents about certain jokes not being appropriate because they'll freak too many people out. Maybe a shrink interview for CYA.

k-mcgrady 13y ago
I would agree with this but he's 19. At 19 you are not a kid and shouldn't need the repercussions of such a statement explained. I think this should be tried in court as a threat to kill, proved he was 'joking' and he should end up with a very, very minor punishment or some time with a psychiatrist. Edit: No reply link for me to respond the below comments so updating here. Re: psychiatrist. >> "There's no suggestion that the comments were caused by mental illness" If someone makes a statement like that and you decide it's a joke and not to punish them having a psychiatrist investigate seems sensible to me. You aren't punishing him so at least make sure he wasn't serious.
- sillysaurus 13y ago
  I think this should be tried in court as a threat to kill You can't be serious?
  - k-mcgrady 13y ago
    That's what he did - he threatened to kill. I'm not familiar with US law so maybe there is something more appropriate he could be charged with. Edit: Based on the US freedom of speech I'm guessing written and oral threats to kill aren't an offence.
    - dalke 13y ago
      Some are, some aren't. At a sports game, when disgruntled fans yell out "kill the ref", they are not charged with a crime, much less required to pay $500,000 in bail, sent into solitary confinement, and occasionally stripped naked while waiting for trial. I believe that it is your viewpoint that any sports player or fan who says anything which can be construed as threatening to kill should be charged with a crime. Here's a specific oral threat from Shannon Sharpe of the Broncos: "we are killing the Patriots". Of course, the larger context is: "Mr. President! Call in the National Guard! Send as many men as you can spare! Because we are killing the Patriots! They need emergency help!" Should he be charged? If so, you have an extremely low threshold for free speech. If not, what makes this not a threat, while the teenager's statement is a threat?

sillysaurus 13y ago

For the record, here's exactly what the teen said: "Oh yeah, I’m real messed up in the head, I’m going to go shoot up a school full of kids and eat their still-beating hearts. Lol jk" That's an obvious joke. The "lol jk" wasn't even necessary to flag it as such.

jlgreco 13y ago
Seriously, eating peoples still beating hearts? I don't care about Poe's Law or how much sarcasm doesn't translate to ascii... if that is not plainly a joke to you then you have some serious issues with the english language that you need to resolve.
- dkersten 13y ago
  I make worse jokes than this on a weekly basis. That something like this could lead to any kind of punishment beyond "stop making tasteless jokes" is insane.
  - jlgreco 13y ago
    Same. I am stunned that this apparently warrants any sort of official response, and I am doubly stunned that so many people seem to support a response of some sort.
    - deleted 13y ago
      [deleted]
droithomme 13y ago
Well, it's not exactly a joke, it's a comment ridiculing the other person by responding with obvious dripping sarcasm. People who really take "eat their still-beating hearts" seriously from a teenager playing a video game have serious difficulty parsing reality. However, I am skeptical that there is anyone that actually took it seriously and didn't understand that this was a sarcastic comment. Those advocating this teen's continued imprisonment while making claims he is a potential mass murderer or terrorist are not sincere, they are interested in promoting the exercise of state power for its own sake.

antihero 13y ago

We don't punish people on being funny, we punish people based on whether it's a serious, credible threat, which this clearly was not. No motive, no means, etc.

Cakez0r 13y ago

So he should be punished because firstly people couldn't infer that he was joking and secondly still couldn't infer that he was joking after he clarified that he was joking? 'jk' is really not that hard to figure out given the context. Regardless of whether people know what he means, his intent is very clear. He shouldn't be punished because some people are too stupid to interpret what he's saying or deliberately misinterpret what he's saying to get him in to trouble.

peferron 13y ago

I feel very unsafe knowing that people like you, who are able to consider seriously a scenario as inhuman as eating the still-beating hearts of children, are still out there and free to go. A normal person wouldn't ever be able to think about it as anything else than a joke. The fact that you consider it realistically possible is very disturbing. Who knows what you could do if your life hits a low point and you suddenly flip your crazy switch? If you were living next door to me, I would report you to the authorities, and hope you get jailed with $1M bail until it's made clear that you aren't a ticking bomb endangering our children.

greedo 13y ago
The sarcasm is strong with this one, young padawan.

GotAnyMegadeth 13y ago

> There are some things normal people don't even joke about Have you never been on the internet before?

cnwejfnwek 13y ago

No, the 'jk' isn't the only thing that makes it clear it was a joke. The phrase "still beating hearts" is an example of ridiculous over-the-top language used for the effect of humour. That's sometimes how humour works, you say something and people know it's not serious, because of how ridiculous it is. For example, if someone threatened to stab you, you might think it was a credible threat. If they threatened to sacrifice you to Kali while sodomising your pet gerbil, it's probably a joke. It's more than just "some people" who joke about dark things. I would say most people make dark or sick jokes with their friends. It's normal behaviour. I find it hard to understand why you don't already know everything I'm saying. In fact it's slightly worrying that you have such a narrow (naive even) view on how "normal" people behave, and yet you feel qualified to have an opinion on the credibility of online threats.

tripzilch 13y ago

> There are some things normal people don't even joke about - this is one of them. Those aren't normal people. At least not "normal" in the sense that you shouldn't keep a very close eye on whether you should worry about what they will do one day. I mean sure, not joking about something is everybody's choice free to make. > It was just a sick statement. It's the ones making baseless assumptions and judgements like this that I am most nervous about.