I can not believe the composure of the students interviewed. I know they are in shock but still it amazes me none-the-less. The instant media witch hunt over the college's actions is disgusting.

 

I just wonder if the the number of victims would have been this tragic if that person was using another weapon instead of a gun. Could one person with a weapon (other than a gun, perhaps a knife) take this many lives?

Should we perhaps focus our attention to the severe consequences of bearing arms instead of focusing on things such as preventing women the rights to choose or even allow equal rights to all human beings not just to heterosexuals?

My heart goes out to those victims and their families. I still vividly remember (even though it was 19 years ago) witnessing 2 students and a faculty (priest) gunned down in our campus. He then shot himself in the head. It took me a long time to get over this incident. I can sympathizze those students and others who have witnessed this massacre. It's a horrible thing to experience.

 

Why couldn't they wait until the smoke cleared before pointing fingers? I was watching CNN last night and Paula Zahn was baiting one of the students during the interview on how the university may be responsible for this. Disgusting!

 

Magnify. Everything. We have more people, so when a twister touches down, it affects more lives. A crackpot shooter affects more lives. A car out of control affects more lives.

I'm not trying to make this tragedy into a pure mathematical exercise, but the sheer number of people now in America and the world mean that out of control events are bound to affect people more than it would 50 years ago.

 

Actually, the autopsy determined that he had a brain tumor. Whether it played a role in his behavior, I don't know.

 

I don't thinks so. How soon we forget our national history of war, genocide, and slavery.

 

That's right, of course, Dean, and I agree. It is possible to identify profound cultural patterns that go all the way back to our historical beginnings. But a culture may have long term aspects and still exhibit shorter term changes in the society.

I was focussing more over the period of my lifetime and my own experiences. Our children -- and hence their parents-- seem to have to be more fearful than we did. I do think our children are regularly exposed to much more violence than we were.

That's my view and I'm sticking to it.

 

I caught a portion of BBC World last night, and the segment quickly digressed into how the VT students had been killed by the NRA. Okay, they didn't say that but they might have.

Two points that stood out were a) they said of Americans that "many believe that they have the right to bear arms" according to the Constitution. The operative word for me was "many", as if the Constitution is a theoretical, nonsensical document.

One other point mentioned that Virginia allows purchase of guns without a background check, which I found interesting.

Please excuse this post--I am not trying to push Rob's fine thread into politics, so please don't take it as such.

 

Guns have always been readily available and sex/violence have always sold but kids growing up today seem to be drowning in both from news, tv, movies, computer games, and the internet. Toss the silent loaner unstable person into the mix, one who has already seen schoolyards turned in to war zones before, and you have mass tragedy waiting again.

 

How is it possible?

The impulse to kill randomley w/o seeming remorse?
The ability to kill so many?
The inability to intervene between episodes?
The inability to prevent/ protect in a free society such acts of violence?

These are hard questions, and as part of our collective grief and shock ones that are inevitable and certainly worth asking.

Consider perhaps the idea of evil, which I haven't heard mentioned much.

Consider perhaps the availabilty of guns w/ the capability of causing such sever casualties. (Perhaps if someone shot back, this incident would've been contained. But what about the hundreds of incidents that escalate to bloodshed when perhaps an exchange of angry words or blows would 'suffice'?)

Perhaps there are no satisfying answers to acts such as these.