Alexis was "an even keeled Buddhist"

[riverwalker]

according to a roommate of three years. (WTF??? )

http://www.dallasnews.com/news/local-news/20130916-officials-id-navy-yard-gunman-as-aaron-alexis-34-of-fort-worth.ece?333

Alexis’ former roommate said he owned a handgun and “can be tough,” but that he wasn’t a violent person. Oui Suthamtewakul said he met Alexis at a Buddhist temple and lived with him for three years in several different locations.

"We became best friends," he said. "He's like my big brother."

Alexis would help out at Suthamtewakul's Thai restaurant, Happy Bowl, on White Settlement Road in Fort Worth. He also became fluent in Thai from watching Thai dramas and talking to people. He also traveled to Thailand at one point.

[Skidmore]

3. Perhaps no one is lying to you and this is just a guy

with mental health issues. Not everything is a conspiracy.

[alcibiades_mystery]

12. Wait. What?

This is too rich!

[arcane1]

13. Damn, that one didn't last long.

Too bad, because they were on a roll!

[NYC_SKP]

26. This one is a repeat customer.

Legendary in her own right, banished perhaps hundreds of times and referred to by moderators back then and by hosts today as "Library Girl", her original handle.

[NoOneMan]

4. Who is they?

[uppityperson]

5. As if. You would think someone hanging around that many books would be better educated.

[arcane1]

10. "Yet?" That day will never come.

[quinnox]

2. Huh, an even keeled buddhist who decided to go on a killing spree

Ok....

[cali]

6. his roommate was clueless.

it's clear the guy had anger issues that he couldn't control. the roommate had to have known.

[DURHAM D]

8. They have reported on tv that he was addicted to violent video games.

The source is another friend from Fort Worth.

[BainsBane]

7. You never really know someone

That "even-keeled" comment reminds me of a similarly awful event. I served as a reference for a student who underwent a federal background check. When the fed interviewed me, I several times said he seemed like a nice, "even-keeled young man." A few months later, he took his girlfriend hostage, killed her parents and himself. Alexis's roommate obviously didn't know what was going on inside of the shooter, any more than I knew what my student was capable of.

[Squinch]

9. An acquaintance of mine was roommates with a girl who killed three of her boyfriends.

Had no clue.

[Skidmore]

14. Yikes.

That's some seriously screwed up person.

[BainsBane]

15. Wow.

It's freaky because people seem so normal, until you find out they aren't.

[Squinch]

20. I know. Not to that extent, but I had an in-law who turned out to be leading a weird

double life. I knew him for decades, and had no idea what he was really like.

[Link Speed]

17. Whoa!

Wow

We had a really sweet housekeeper in Texas, but we noticed that things had started going missing. Things such as silverware, handguns, some jewelry, etc. But we were doing a lot of coke back then and didn't give it much thought.

Then, one day, the door came crashing in and the house was full of cops.

Long story short, our sweet housekeeper/nanny had killed five previous employers when they faced off over her thefts.

She lived in our house.

[Squinch]

18. Oh. My. God! Your NANNY!!!! That's way tooo close!!!!

[Link Speed]

21. It was surreal

Our sons were probably 5 and 3.

When the cops told us what was going on, I felt as if I was hallucinating.

[Nay]

23. Holy shit. I'd have an out-of-body experience too. What a nightmare!

[Link Speed]

28. I forgot to add...

She would make it look like murder/suicide except for the elderly widow who 'tripped' down the stairs.

[IdaBriggs]

38. You were doing coke with two young children?

Huh?

[Link Speed]

43. We weren't smoking crack and we didn't get high during the day.

We would put the boys to bed and head out on the town, leaving them with the killer nanny. Our sons were never negatively affected by our lifestyle and we could well afford it.

It was Austin in the mid-80s and we were having a ball.

[Boom Sound 416]

24. Wait, what?

You had what go missing while doing what with who, when?

Did I miss something or everything?

[Link Speed]

27. She had been stealing from former employers

When confronted by said employers, she killed them. She made it look like murder/suicide.

We would have been the next victims. Our sons were 3 and 5.

[muriel_volestrangler]

16. And he also shot through his ceiling when his upstairs neighbour was noisy

in 2010 in Texas, and in 2004 in Seattle he shot the tyres of building contractors that he thought were parking in the wrong place. Worryingly, he got into the Naval Reserve after that.

[X_Digger]

19. Religion has what to do with this? Substitute another religion and see how stereotypical this sounds

DU is better than this.

[MH1]

30. It's a QUOTE. From a 3-year roommate giving an interview.

Did you not realize it's a quote, or do you think DU shouldn't be discussing it because it mentions religion?

I saw part of that interview on TV. A Thai guy, who is coming from the perspective that "even keeled Buddhist" = "how could this guy I thought I knew possibly do THIS?"

So what if it was a Southern Baptist guy saying "I roomed with him 3 years and he was a real devout, mellow Christian"? So what?

[X_Digger]

32. I realize it's a quote. A stereotypical quote.

To think that person of X religion shouldn't/couldn't/wouldn't act in a certain way or perform a certain act- is an ignorant stereotype.

And it should be mocked as such.

It doesn't fly for Muslims, Jews, or Christians, either.

[MH1]

34. Ok, that's your point of view. But, the "stereotype" was promoted by a guy who comes from a Buddhist

culture and who probably believes that it's an accurate stereotype.

I don't think we should be mocking a guy who is almost certainly innocent of any wrongdoing and must be shocked if not traumatized by what has happened. Just my opinion though.

Also, you could drop the Buddhist and it still comes out "even-keeled", which communicates that the guy wouldn't have expected his former roommate to do anything like this.

[X_Digger]

37. Because a Buddhist promotes it doesn't make it true.

We've all seen the people close to violent or disturbed perpetrators try to distance themselves from the actions of the perpetrators- "He was a quiet neighbor.", "He was turning his life around.", "My baby wouldn't hurt a fly.", "He would give you the shirt off his back."

What they're often trying to do is assuage their own guilt; they think to themselves, "Was there something I should have seen? Was there something that I saw but ignored?"

[maxsolomon]

25. Maybe he was trying to keep his demons at bay by studying Buddhism

And he failed. If anything, Buddhism delayed this rampage.

Oui Suthamtewakul probably didn't know about the anger/shootings in WA & TX.

How Alexis had a CCW but was arrested twice, in 2 different states, for gun offenses, is THE issue.

[liberal_at_heart]

31. you're probably right about that.

[fujiyama]

29. Religion and spirituality cannot cure or address underlying mental health issues

especially if a person is suffering from a severe mental illness or has violent tendencies or urges. Couple these unresolved problems (which are often stigmatized and cannot be discussed within polite company) with easy access to firearms, and as a society and a nation we're bound to have plenty of this violence erupting. With the number of guns out there, it's actually shocking there aren't more of these types of mass murders. But easy access to guns has been clearly shown to be correlated with all types of gun homicides (domestic murder, suicides, drug/gang related murders, and even police shootings/incidents where people are shot by them)...

Unfortunately, as Colorado indicated, any reasonable approach to addressing gun violence is political kryptonite. And that same side has no interest in making access to mental health services any easier.

[jazzimov]

35. Then, he wasn't a Buddhist.

I'm a Taoist, of the school of thought that Lao-tse tried to teach Guantanamo, but he never really "got it".

Still, Buddhism is close enough to Taoism that I can say a Buddhist would never have done this.

I know, the "No True Scotsman" meme - but it doesn't apply in this case.

Buddhism has strict pacifist rules - if he resorted to violence then he was no longer a Buddhist.

He may have claimed to hold Buddhist principles beforehand, but at the point he decided that Violence was the answer he was no longer a Buddhist.

[Llewlladdwr]

39. Wow. Not even a Buddhist yourself but you get to pick and chose who is?

If dude claimed to be a Buddhist then he is. Like any other major world religion there are many different sects. Besides which, Buddism is not a particularly peaceful religion, at least not as practised by normal human beings. The first precept is "To refrain from taking life", not a ban on doing so. Even Buddhists accept the permissability of self-defense.

[bhikkhu]

36. An even-keeled tough-guy buddhist with guns?

I suppose it could happen, but something was wrong with that picture even before he killed all those people.

on edit, not that it really adds to the understanding, but Thailand is the most predominately buddhist country in the world, and its capital, Bangkok, is on the top 10 list of most violent cities. Mostly attributed to the drug trade.

Good and evil exist side-by-side in cultures, and in individuals; you can't really make generalities based on religion or culture, as the difference between individuals within any religion or culture is greater than the difference between religions and cultures.

[Recursion]

40. There are Buddhist terrorist organizations in East Asia

And a leader who calls himself "the Buddhist Bin Ladin".

At one point a bunch of monks rioted in I think the Myanmar parliament. The headline was "fists and robes were flying", which amused me.

[The Straight Story]

41. Another responsible buddhist. Even if 0.02% of buddhists hurt someone

We must blame them all (works on other topics of late).

[FarCenter]

42. He recently traveled to Thailand

According to Alexis’s landlord, friends, and a former roommate, Alexis was a practicing Buddhist who frequented a Buddhist temple in Fort Worth to meditate and help out. He had begun learning Thai and recently returned from Thailand. His friends expressed disbelief that Alexis would be involved in the violence. One told reporters Alexis “could not be the shooter.” An aunt who says the family hasn’t seen him for a few years said she’d “be shocked if it was him.”

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/09/16/up-to-speed-5-things-to-know-about-navy-yard-shooter-aaron-alexis.html