Tuesday, April 17, 2007
How Does One Explain the VA TECH Killings?
Just what kind of world are we living in these days?
Since 9/11 we have all been so focused on terrorism, when in reality we really need to be looking at our own society. No one can really know what was in the mind of the killer and why he would feel the need to take innocent people's lives in the process, but I can't help but try to ponder the questions we all have as a result of so many being killed without a reason. ["Being in the wrong place at the wrong time"] is perhaps one way of thinking about it but I believe there are roots that contribute to the action. I'm not suggesting that I'm some kind of psychologist, but certainly our society needs to look at its insides: What are we doing to our children, to students, to workers, to regular citizens that is making them lash out?
[Correction to this blog: Please note that the statement: "Being in the wrong place at the wrong time" was what President Bush said at the VA TECH Service for the victims. I found then as I do now that it was a stupid comment; the students were in a classroom where they normally had class. How in the world were they in the wrong place?]
War in other places certainly is disturbing and constant glorification of violence in the media is bound to have some effect on the least of us. Thank God that most of us know fiction from reality but certainly Iraq is not fiction nor the massacres in Africa and other places in the world.
What we need is a return to conversation and less violence around. The media can still report what is happening but they certainly don't have to glorify it, over and over again--repeating, repeating until most of us are sick to our stomachs.
Listening to WAMU 88.5 in Washington, DC today was refreshing in that the host focused on the lives that were lost rather than the details of how or why they were killed or the life of the killer.
Knowing that some commented that if more people had had guns on their persons then perhaps someone might have been able to stop the killer only leads me to think there is truly something "sick" about our society. How many of you would feel comfortable knowing that someone at a local restaurant, bar, or classroom might be carrying a gun who is not an "authorized" police or person to carry a gun? I can say without any hesitation that if I were to see someone carrying a gun in a restaurant, bar, or classroom who is not a police I would immediately leave the premises.
Yes, we should have the right to bear arms but there are reasonable limits and it is time for Congress to listen to Americans and not a powerful lobbying organization.
I'm extremely disturbed by the killings because like many across the country I teach for a living at a college and pray that nothing like this happens again.
My thoughts are with the families and friends of those whose lives were taken.
Since 9/11 we have all been so focused on terrorism, when in reality we really need to be looking at our own society. No one can really know what was in the mind of the killer and why he would feel the need to take innocent people's lives in the process, but I can't help but try to ponder the questions we all have as a result of so many being killed without a reason. ["Being in the wrong place at the wrong time"] is perhaps one way of thinking about it but I believe there are roots that contribute to the action. I'm not suggesting that I'm some kind of psychologist, but certainly our society needs to look at its insides: What are we doing to our children, to students, to workers, to regular citizens that is making them lash out?
[Correction to this blog: Please note that the statement: "Being in the wrong place at the wrong time" was what President Bush said at the VA TECH Service for the victims. I found then as I do now that it was a stupid comment; the students were in a classroom where they normally had class. How in the world were they in the wrong place?]
War in other places certainly is disturbing and constant glorification of violence in the media is bound to have some effect on the least of us. Thank God that most of us know fiction from reality but certainly Iraq is not fiction nor the massacres in Africa and other places in the world.
What we need is a return to conversation and less violence around. The media can still report what is happening but they certainly don't have to glorify it, over and over again--repeating, repeating until most of us are sick to our stomachs.
Listening to WAMU 88.5 in Washington, DC today was refreshing in that the host focused on the lives that were lost rather than the details of how or why they were killed or the life of the killer.
Knowing that some commented that if more people had had guns on their persons then perhaps someone might have been able to stop the killer only leads me to think there is truly something "sick" about our society. How many of you would feel comfortable knowing that someone at a local restaurant, bar, or classroom might be carrying a gun who is not an "authorized" police or person to carry a gun? I can say without any hesitation that if I were to see someone carrying a gun in a restaurant, bar, or classroom who is not a police I would immediately leave the premises.
Yes, we should have the right to bear arms but there are reasonable limits and it is time for Congress to listen to Americans and not a powerful lobbying organization.
I'm extremely disturbed by the killings because like many across the country I teach for a living at a college and pray that nothing like this happens again.
My thoughts are with the families and friends of those whose lives were taken.
Comments:
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I certainly agree with you about the state of affairs in this country. We like to think that the US is a very civilized place, but unfortunately, tragedies like this speak to the contrary.
I am a mother of three, limit the time my children watch TV, monitor their readings, the songs they listen to, the movies they want to watch and insist on keeping a healthy warm environment, which is very difficult nowadays, with the reality of war invading our everyday spaces. Our world is plagued with violence, and those in favor of carrying guns want to go back to the Wild Wild West. Let's speak up and monitor what our political leaders are saying. The Va Teach students were not in the wrong place at the wrong time, they were in classs! they were where they were supposed to be as students! please, let's choose our words carefully... they were doing what they were supposed to be doing, being kids!
I am sick of the media and the empty speeches. We have become so vulnerable, and all thanks to our histrionic foreign policy!!!
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I am a mother of three, limit the time my children watch TV, monitor their readings, the songs they listen to, the movies they want to watch and insist on keeping a healthy warm environment, which is very difficult nowadays, with the reality of war invading our everyday spaces. Our world is plagued with violence, and those in favor of carrying guns want to go back to the Wild Wild West. Let's speak up and monitor what our political leaders are saying. The Va Teach students were not in the wrong place at the wrong time, they were in classs! they were where they were supposed to be as students! please, let's choose our words carefully... they were doing what they were supposed to be doing, being kids!
I am sick of the media and the empty speeches. We have become so vulnerable, and all thanks to our histrionic foreign policy!!!
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