‘Angry’ Murray Likens Texas School Shooting Survivor’s Experience to His Own

Andy Murray. (AFP)
Andy Murray. (AFP)
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‘Angry’ Murray Likens Texas School Shooting Survivor’s Experience to His Own

Andy Murray. (AFP)
Andy Murray. (AFP)

Britain's two-time Wimbledon champion Andy Murray said the mass shooting in Uvalde, Texas made him "angry", adding that a survivor's account of the incident was similar to his own experience in the 1996 Dunblane massacre in Scotland.

An 18-year-old gunman armed with a semi-automatic rifle stormed an elementary school in Texas last week, killing 19 children and two teachers.

The attack, coming 10 days after a shooting in Buffalo, New York that left 10 people dead, has intensified the long-standing national debate over US gun laws.

"It's unbelievably upsetting and it makes you angry. I think there's been over 200 mass shootings in America this year and nothing changes," Murray said. "I can't understand that ...

"My feeling is that surely at some stage you do something different. You can't keep approaching the problem by buying more guns and having more guns in the country. I don't see how that solves it.

"But I could be wrong. Let's maybe try something different and see if you get a different outcome."

Murray grew up in Dunblane and was a student at the town's local elementary school when a gunman killed 16 pupils and a teacher before killing himself. It is the deadliest mass shooting in Britain's modern history.

"I heard something on the radio the other day and it was a child from that school," Murray told the BBC. "I experienced a similar thing when I was at Dunblane, a teacher coming out and waving all of the children under tables and telling them to go and hide.

"And it was a kid telling exactly the same story about how she survived it.

"They were saying that they go through these drills, as young children ... How? How is that normal that children should be having to go through drills, in case someone comes into a school with a gun?"



Paris Olympics Organizers Say They Meant no Disrespect with 'Last Supper' Tableau

Religious conservatives from around the world decried the segment (The AP)
Religious conservatives from around the world decried the segment (The AP)
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Paris Olympics Organizers Say They Meant no Disrespect with 'Last Supper' Tableau

Religious conservatives from around the world decried the segment (The AP)
Religious conservatives from around the world decried the segment (The AP)

Paris Olympics organizers apologized Sunday to anyone who was offended by a tableau that evoked Leonardo da Vinci’s “The Last Supper” during the glamorous opening ceremony.

Da Vinci's painting depicts the moment when Jesus Christ declared that an apostle would betray him. The scene during Friday's ceremony featured DJ and producer Barbara Butch — an LGBTQ+ icon — flanked by drag artists and dancers.

Religious conservatives from around the world decried the segment, with the French Catholic Church’s conference of bishops deploring “scenes of derision” that they said made a mockery of Christianity — a sentiment echoed by Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova. The Anglican Communion in Egypt expressed its “deep regret” Sunday, saying the ceremony could cause the IOC to “lose its distinctive sporting identity and its humanitarian message.”

The ceremony’s artistic director Thomas Jolly said it was meant to celebrate diversity and pay tribute to feasting and French gastronomy. Paris 2024 spokesperson Anne Descamps was asked about the outcry during an International Olympic Committee news conference on Sunday.