Seven dead in Tokyo knife attack

[muriel_volestrangler]

Source: BBC

A man armed with a knife has killed seven people and injured 10 others in central Tokyo, Japanese media say.

The incident occurred in the Akihabara district, a busy shopping area known as Electric Town that is popular with young people and tourists.

A suspect, said to be 25-year-old Tomohiro Kato, has been arrested.

Police spokesman Jiro Akaogi told reporters: "The suspect said he came to Akihabara to kill people. He said he was tired of life".

Read more: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7442327.stm

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Note that some may have been killed by the vehicle he drove into them, as well as the knifing.

[conspirator]

1. Jesus, I have been in ElectricTown 2 years ago. Living in Tokyo can be very stressing n/t

[Art_from_Ark]

15. Life in Tokyo may be stressful

but the perpetrator is from a relatively small city in Shizuoka Prefecture.

By the way, I was at the intersection where the attack occurred just last week. Pretty strange feeling.

[-..__...]

2. Obviously the knife control laws in Japan are pretty lax.

When are people over there going to wake up and demand stricter laws to end the bloodshed and carnage?

[bahrbearian]

3. Yea, what Japan needs is a law mandating that everyone carry a gun.

this kind of thing wouldn't happen.

[Pavulon]

4. Japan with complete ban

has a higher murder than Switzerland where machine guns are common in homes.

[bertman]

7. NOW THERE'S A LITTLE-KNOWN FACTOID FOR YA.

And I thought they'd never been invaded in modern times because they are a NEUTRAL country.


This could explain all the holes in Swiss cheese.

[muriel_volestrangler]

10. Really? UN figures

homicide rate/100,000 1998 1999 2000
Japan                 0.57 0.53 0.50
Switzerland           1.07 1.25 0.96

http://www.unodc.org/pdf/crime/seventh_survey/7sv.pdf

[Pavulon]

12. My error, both have trended down over the years from those numbers

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_mur_percap-crime-murders-per-capita

however they are quite close considering a complete ban in japan and swiss gun laws.

[Art_from_Ark]

18. Quite close?

Swiss rates are double Japan's rates.

[daleo]

14. Thanks, hard facts are always useful.

For interest's sake, the U.S. is about 4.5, Canada is about 1.6, England about 1.5. South Africa is about 60, Russia about 20.

[ohio2007]

5. The emperor should put out a decree,mandate,edict or fatwa outlawing this behavior

[Art_from_Ark]

39. Japanese emperors haven't done that sort of thing since the war

Today's Emperor of Japan is little more than a figurehead, like European monarchs. But unlike them, he doesn't even get to have his face on Japanese money.

[pop goes the weasel]

6. "tired of life"

Why do so many people who are personally "tired of life" decide to take the lives of other people? If this guy's life was so onerous, surely he could have found a bridge to drive off of. Instead, he surrendered when the cops pointed guns at him. "Tired of life," my ass. Just a hater with no regard for other people.

[Art_from_Ark]

16. He said not only that he was "tired of life" ("seikatsu ni tsukare...")

but that he "hated the world" ("...yononaka ga kirai ni natta").

[Crowman1979]

27. He would have been better off commiting sempuku...

...and making a public show of his discontent of the world, rather than take the lives of others.

[Art_from_Ark]

36. Maybe he wanted to make a "name" for himself?

Or he didn't want to die alone?

It's similar to the murder-suicides in the US where the perps go on a rampage against family, co-workers, etc., before turning on themselves. I've never understood the mentality, but we're not dealing with rational minds here.

[LeftyMom]

8. Four thousand throats may be cut in one knife by a running man with a knife. -Klingon proverb

Determination is a good thing, except in the violently crazy.

[Flagg]

9. How many would he have killed had he had a gun ?

[gullwing300]

11. It depends. Knives don't need reloading.

...

[Art_from_Ark]

17. A lot more

Three of the 7 fatalities seem to have been caused by getting run over by his rental truck, so it seems like he fatally stabbed 4 others. If he had had an assault-type rifle he could have killed far more because of the huge number of people walking the street, which had been closed off to vehicles.

[conspirator]

20. not many if EVERYONE had guns. I am a moderate towards the right to bear arms

It should be forbidden to carry weapons in densily populated areas.
But I don't see any problems to have automatic weapons in small towns.

[Art_from_Ark]

21. Akihabara, where the incident occurred, is in Tokyo

which is a very densely populated area. So even if Japan allowed gun ownership, no one there would have had guns anyway, according to your criteria.

[conspirator]

22. yes. All city centers would definitely be a no gun area. It would be hard to enforce it though

Buildings could have gun detectors. But you would need road checks to ensure people wouldn't drive into the city center with automatic weapons in their trunk.

[Art_from_Ark]

23. Personally, I don't like road checks

And enforcing such checks in Tokyo, which is huge, would be impossible.

I would much rather have Japan (where I live) remain a (mostly) gun-free zone.

[benEzra]

30. You realize that automatic weapons are already restricted by Federal law, yes? (n/t)

[Lydia Leftcoast]

13. Some of the oddities of Japanese society can produce very warped people

Every once in a while, someone goes berserk in a knife or razor blade attack.

[Art_from_Ark]

19. A little more than 2 months ago,

there was a similar incident at a train station in my area. Like the crazy nut at Akihabara, the perp there said he just wanted to kill someone, anyone. After he slashed three or four bystanders, he went to an unattended police substation and called another police station on the phone and basically said "I did it! Nyah, nyah, you can't catch me!" :crazy:

[Lydia Leftcoast]

24. When I was a student in Japan many years ago

there was a case of a high school girl (unusual--it's usually young men) who went berserk with a straight razor and ran through a crowd in Shinjuku attacking people. She didn't kill anyone, but it was one of many incidents that occurred in my first couple of months there that made me think, "What am I doing in this weird country?"

[Art_from_Ark]

25. They had (have?) a word for such girls in Kansai--

"sukeban". I don't know if it is still in use, but when I learned it, the definition always included some bit about "sukeban" girls having razor blades.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

26. Looking through Amazon Japan for DVDs, I found several episodes of

a series called "Sukeban Deka," although I don't know how old it is.

[-..__...]

28. "Oddities"? "warped people"?

Ahhh... that would be the scat and bukkake fetish they have over there.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

29. Those are two manifestations, yes, but

I was thinking more of the types of families in which children are alternately coddled (not required to assume even the simplest responsibilities in real life) and pressured intensely (to be a high achiever who presents a picture of perfection to the world at large).

There are many ways in which the craziness can come out.

[slackmaster]

34. I've been told that Japanese boys are coddled massively until age 10

Then suddenly expected to act like adults.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

35. In my experience, they're coddled massively all through their youth

It's very common for young people to live with their parents till marriage, and while both sons and daughters are coddled by U.S. standards (very few household chores, if any), the sons are particularly helpless.

There's more pressure to achieve and present a "manly" face to the world as they grow older, but Mom continues to wait on them like a servant.

[Art_from_Ark]

37. The degree of coddling probably depends on the family

The boys who appear to be destined for a "good" university probably get coddled more than the ones who are destined for a blue collar occupation.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

38. Definitely, but the girls are coddled less

They're expected to take responsibility for younger kids in a way that boys rarely are.

[Irreverend IX]

40. A lot of the ones I knew had very little parental contact...

Because of the long commutes that a typical Japanese life requires, a lot of teenage kids spend most of their free time outside school hanging out with peers and return home as late as they can. A lot of the families I got to know had weird passive-aggressive relationships going on, and one guy told me in no uncertain terms that "I like my dad okay but I hate my mom." Weird stuff. I wonder if the killer was one of the "Akiba-kei" geeks who flock to that district.

[Art_from_Ark]

41. A lot of the kids have "club activities" after school

"Bu-katsudo" (extracurricular/club activities) can take up a lot of junior high and high school kids' free time, especially if they are in sports or music clubs.

[TheProphet5]

31. :(

[benEzra]

32. Tragic. Thoughts and prayers for the families and surviving victims. (n/t)

[slackmaster]

33. Bummer

:argh: