Free speech

Now the left is claiming that they can predict mass shootings based upon the social media posts of individuals- even when those posts are not considered threatening. It seems that they are matching speech patterns of people to see if they match speech patterns of mass shooters. Right now, police are arresting people for saying things like:

3 more days of probation left then I get my AR-15 back. Don’t go to Walmart next week

Which most people recognize as being a real and immediate threat. However, they are proposing that the use of phrases like: “I,” “me,” and “mine.” indicates a person who is more likely to do violence than a person who uses words like: “great,” “happy,” and “amazing.” They go on to claim that a person can be diagnosed with personality disorders or depression, based on nothing more than their social media posts. They claim that that people who become violent are more likely to use emotionally laden words like “shit,” “hate,” “you” and “they.” while being less likely to use words about the external world, such as “people,” “world,” “state” and “time.”

This is pure pseudoscience, of course. Using this hypothesis, a person would be considered unlikely to commit violence if they said something like: “The people of the world would be happier if we took time to make the state safer by executing everyone who owns weapons of war. Wouldn’t that be amazing?” While the person who replies with: “I think your idea of killing people is bullshit. I hate it. You have no right to take my guns, they are mine.” would be considered a killer in waiting.

The scary part is in the last paragraph:

we are optimistic that these words can offer a window—and a warning—about individuals’ intentions. This work is by no means a standalone solution to gun violence or terrorism, but it might help, even as predicting and preventing these sorts of attacks remains incredibly difficult.

Gun bloggers and social media posters beware: Your words will soon be used against you.