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Comment by bitlax | Hacker News Reader

If you're sincere, how would you comprehensively describe the background of the shooter and his modus operandi? What sources have you used to gather this information to this point?

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Which answers do I need to give for you to help me out here? Are you going to? I'm not looking for an argument.

Here's the thing: you're posting from an eight-day-old account. Maybe you're an alt of someone I've already been speaking with. Maybe you're a cocksure but confused college student. I have no idea. But you've made an appeal and I'm not cynical. You're asking me to do your work for free, and not doing so is my prerogative, as is your ability to say what you want about me. I think if you write for a bit about this situation I'll be able to see where it's going, and if I still think you're sincere we can go from there.

I've tried to figure out what the evidence is for this and come up with extremely little. I've tried, and can't find it. A lot of people seem really confident in it. I want to read what they're reading, and I cannot find it.

[EDIT] FWIW I've yet to see anything that makes me confident enough to assign any strong and specific guess about the guy's motivations. I'm confident in "he was very online" and "he played Helldivers a lot, or at least spent a lot of time communicating with people who do" and that's about all I'd feel comfortable confidently asserting if someone asked me for the "TL;DR" on where we're at on that.