Cho Seung-Hui: A Lone Deranged Gunman?

<p>Thursday, April 19. 2007</p>
<p>As all of America mourns the deaths which occurred on the Virginia Tech campus, bloggers are drawing comparisons to the body count that issues daily from Iraq. See a particularly poignant post from Floyd Rudmin of <b>commondreams.org</b> titled "32 Senseless Deaths: A Chance for Empathy, Change of Heart, and Change of Course" which concludes:</p>
<blockquote>The tragedy at Virginia Tech was caused by lone gunman, probably deranged. It was a one-time event. It is finished. The tragedy in Iraq was caused by the US government, with the over-whelming support of the US Congress, most of the US media, and much of the US population. This war was planned and executed by rational men and women, none of them deranged.</blockquote>
<blockquote>The US decided to start the war against Iraq.</blockquote>
<blockquote>The US decided to destroy the infrastructure of Iraq.</blockquote>
<blockquote>The US decided to destroy the Iraqi government and to disband its police and army.</blockquote>
<blockquote>The US decided to send too few soldiers to secure the nation after doing these destructive deeds.</blockquote>
<blockquote>And the tragedy of Iraq is not a one-time event. It is not finished. It continues, apparently without end.</blockquote>
<blockquote>By many reports, the US is now preparing to start another war, this time against Iran.</blockquote>
<blockquote>Americans feeling the shock and grief of the tragedy at Virginia Tech should look into their hearts and realize that they through their government are bringing this same tragedy again, and again, and again, and again, and again, endlessly and needlessly, to other people in the world who also have hearts that can be torn out, who also feel grief and loss when family and friends are suddenly killed when doing ordinary things of life, like going to school.</blockquote>
<blockquote>Tragic deaths force us to feel our humanity and to see we are similar to others in the world. The tragic deaths in Virginia might serve to motivate Americans to curb their militarism and to minimize the tragedies of sudden death that they have been bringing to other families in the world.</blockquote>
<blockquote>Read the <a href="http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/04/18/593/">full article</a>.</blockquote>
<p>It is heartening to witness a vigorous debate emerging online as people come to terms with these killings and their significance, not only for the victims and their families and friends, but for an entire culture. As Americans draw comparisons to Iraq, we who are not American are reminded that America is a house divided. I sometimes catch myself drawing hasty generalizations, styling all Americans as arrogant war-mongerers. But the comments I read online remind me that, in fact, those who share the president&#39;s world view stand in a minority. I must pause to recognize that most Americans grieve for the state of their country and fear for their safety abroad. As non-Americans, our generalizations merely implicate us in the sins we condemn.</p>
<p>Perhaps a more difficult task comes in moderating the generalizations we make as we consider Cho Seung-Hui who was the perpetrator of these killings. Every account I have read thus far refers to him as "deranged." Doubtless a person who commits mass murder is mentally ill. But the use of this particular epithet continues the media habit of drawing a causal connection between violence and mental illness. This is an oversimplification, much like the suggestion that American troops are in Iraq to stabilize a country that has no infrastructure of its own.</p>
<p>The media&#39;s continuing association of violence and mental illness perpetuates the stigma which haunts millions of people who suffer from major mental health issues. In fact, mental illness is <b>not</b> a significant indicator of violence. See this pdf document from the <a href="http://theoblog.ca/serendipity/archives/www.camh.net/education/Resources_communities_organizations/addressing_stigma_senatepres03.pdf">Centre for Addiction and Mental Health</a>. Indicators which are more significant include: youth, male gender, and history of violence or substance abuse. Let me make that a little clearer: if you are a male, that fact alone is a stronger predictor of violent behaviour than if you suffer from schizophrenia. A non-clinical list of indicators might also include such factors as availability of weapons and exposure to desensitizing materials (e.g. video games, movies, media that televise a killer&#39;s manifesto and cell phone video of shots being fired, etc). From the CAMH document comes this quote:</p>
<blockquote>"While it is true that some people who have a mental illness do commit crimes, public perceptions of mentally ill persons as criminally dangerous are exaggerated. In fact, 80 to 90 percent of people with mental illness never commit violent acts. <i>They are actually more likely to have acts of violence committed against them</i>, particularly homeless individuals who may also have a mental illness." (Italics added.)</blockquote>
<p>If the mentally ill are more likely to be victims of violent acts, then it is possible that Cho Seung-Hui only became a risk <i>after</i> he was, himself, victimized. Following the shootings at Columbine, it was revealed that the shooters, Harris & Klebold, were victims of significant bullying. The same is probably true in this instance. See here for a <a href="http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20070416/school_shootings_070415">profile of Cho</a>.</p>
<p>Let&#39;s not perpetrate a generalization about mental illness. Let&#39;s seize this moment as an opportunity to put an end to a cycle of violence by putting an end to our fears of mental illness. I would invite Floyd Rudmin and <b>commondreams.org</b> to revise their post. There were 33 senseless deaths. To state that there were 32 reveals a stigmatizing bias that we must reckon with. Otherwise, our generalizations merely implicate us in the sins we condemn.</p>
<p>Posted by <a href="http://theoblog.ca/serendipity/authors/1-David-Barker">David Barker</a> in <a href="http://theoblog.ca/serendipity/categories/8-HealthMental-Health">Health/Mental Health</a> at <a href="http://theoblog.ca/serendipity/archives/248-Cho-Seung-Hui-A-Lone-Deranged-Gunman.html">23:08</a></p>
<p>--</p>
<p>Original Source: <a href="http://theoblog.ca/serendipity/archives/248-Cho-Seung-Hui-A-Lone-Deranged-Gunman.html">http://theoblog.ca/serendipity/archives/248-Cho-Seung-Hui-A-Lone-Deranged-Gunman.html</a></p>
<p>Licensed under <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/">Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5</a>.</p>

David Barker

2007-06-06

Brent Jesiek

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5

eng

Some thoughts on the Cho identity and mass murder

April 18th, 2007 by <a href="http://ryanlanham.wordpress.com/author/ryanlanham/">Ryan Lanham</a>

I know very little about profoundly deviant behavior of this sort. It has never much interested me. I tend to turn off the channels where it is dealt with.

I have extended familial ties to some protracted and difficult cases but rarely anything profoundly deviant like this. I have also had many friends and acquaintances who cope with various forms of mental illness in their relationships both near and extended. But this seems to be of a different sort...I think. I so far believe it isn&#39;t a "9" on a scale where many folks are showing up at the mental health center with a level 4 or 5 problem. But on that I may be sadly wrong. Things erode rapidly sometimes. Tear out hope from people and prospects go decay in a hurry. But people are usually self-destructive first...not outwardly destructive. Something is different when people need to spread a blight.

It seems to me that the Virginia Tech murderer reached several cross-over points. For example, he constructed an identity of persecution. I am sure he had opportunities to back out of this, but he chose not to. He wanted to be persecuted. I notice this desire in many larger groups...sometimes whole nations. It is a need to be selected as a target of unfairness. At some level we all feel it. It is very hard to look for a job, for example, in academia without some sense of constant rejection. Maybe it is luck to get help or a positive turn, and some folks just aren&#39;t lucky. Maybe Cho never got cut a break. But it seems like he did get at least a few breaks to hear it from his roommates. He CHOSE to not find happiness.

Perhaps that paranoia is an element of a broader delusional identity, but all that sounds annoyingly redundant. I must say that the psychological descriptions of these things feel inadequate. It is as if there are things unsaid or said as categorizations that seem deficient to offer any insight beyond a label. There is a Peanuts cartoon with Lucy psychoanalyzing Charlie Brown&#39;s fears. She says that if we can find out what he is afraid of..."we" can label it. It ends there to some ironic comic effect. The label is all Charlie Brown is going to get. DSM IV is my sister-in-law&#39;s bible on these things. I have seen her read it at length. But from what I have seen of it, it is often very uncertain and highly generalized in its descriptions. Can anyone be paranoid on a given day? I often wonder whether people who are less than nice all the time carry the burden of common labels. Identity is profound in all these cases.

Universities clearly gather many people who are loners, focused, obsessive, and often politically extreme. But violence is not the usual outlet, so far as I can tell. I think I have read that suicides are typically higher amongst graduate students than the norm, but that might be also readily expected from the stress. One sees faculty and students alike who demonstrate all sorts of unsual forms of expression or self-awareness. Sometimes it comes as a rarified sense of aesthetic or insight. Other forms come as a need to be "in" or considered "bright." Some thrive on power or influence over others as a teacher or mentor or special peer. Still other forms come as a need to be considered of a particular ethical purity. Usually it is exacting in my experience. There is a need for precision far beyond what could be taken as usual or appropriate.

This sort of intensity is a form of boundary spanning that can be innovative if benign. Or it can be destructive, and often minimally policed. Given the general collapse of collective standards in the academy, I think these sorts of explosions are my likely than we&#39;d like to think. I also think they are playing out in mini versions all too often. But people find means of coping and controlling themselves. Here that control was not present. An artist or innovator must also loosen the bounds of control, but there is a commitment to not hurt. It is almost like the difference between the responsible community business person and the naked aggression of a self-serving capitalist. There is a different...ethic. But is there a different psychology? And what would that mean? The identity is formed as it encounters situations. Context is everything...but also not everything. We must know actors, actor prior states, and contexts. But perhaps we must also know context prior states. It is difficult to say the least.

Original source: <a href=" http://ryanlanham.wordpress.com/2007/04/18/some-thoughts-on-the-cho-identity-and-mass-murder/"> http://ryanlanham.wordpress.com/2007/04/18/some-thoughts-on-the-cho-identity-and-mass-murder/</a>

Licensed under <a href=" http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0</a>

Ryan Lanham

2007-06-05

Chad Newswander

eng

Could the Virginia Tech shooting been avoided?

<a href="http://www.groundreport.com/Queenbee7519">Nafeesah Abdullah</a>
May 06, 2007

In light of recent events this just gets added to the list of school shootings that have taken place over the last 5+ years and what seems to be motive is identical the perpetrators are young white males under the age of 21 with a history of disturbing behavior either expressed through writing or other means like music, video games, and artwork. This situation took a small turn since the perpetrator was a 23 year old Asian (Korean) male. The loner mentality wasn&#39;t anything new because the two guys at Columbine also were loners too and the other perpetrators of past school shootings were also loners too with family issues.

As a former college RA I have experienced students who are not as social as others, but I made it my responsibility to check in with my residents just to let them know I am there for them if they needed anything even someone to talk to. You got some RA&#39;s who are in the job just for the perks, but are not true to the job of being a student leader and someone who is held to standards to uphold and adhere to the job and what it entails. RA&#39;s need to be retrained to understand that they are in a position to serve students and to exercise their skills as a student leader, and having a more personal approach to how they interact with students.

Most students who tend to be loners don&#39;t have a lot of friends and usually are the butt of people&#39;s jokes for being strange or weird and just plain dysfunctional. The RA who was among the victims of this horrific crime didn&#39;t deserve what he got, but this should be a wake up call to RA&#39;s who treat students like they don&#39;t matter. This should be a wake up call to students and teachers period that if you recognize someone who tends to be a loner to speak up because this can stop the violence in schools and it&#39;s not just college, but in grade and high schools everywhere. Students don&#39;t want to feel that they&#39;re ratting someone out, but would they rather tell on someone who&#39;s like this than to be the target of their anger and aggression when it builds up to the point that it hits the breaking point? This is where we have to take action, and not wait until something happens for us to do something about the problem. Columbine should have not happened, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold&#39;s parents should have taken note of what their sons&#39; teachers and counselors said about the disturbing behavior and maybe then something could have been done and the shootings would have not happened.

It took a sad tragedy like what happened at Virginia Tech for people to recognize that the mentality of those who tend to spend time alone can be dangerous. For some of us who are attending college as undergrads and graduate students we should be able to feel safe on the campuses that we are attending classes at, and we shouldn&#39;t have to worry about some student who&#39;s disturbed who&#39;s got issues taking their anger out on innocent people.Innocent lives were senselessly lost due to a student&#39;s silent anger, and when it was made public by his English professor that his writing assignments were of pedophilia and murder should have tipped off the university that this student has issues and should have been treated as such.

Are school administrations planning to take teachers and counselors seriously when they bring to their attention reports of a student(s) erratic and disturbing behavior where it involves some kind of harm to people or things or even committing acts of violence against a certain group of people or gender? There&#39;s got to be some accountability on a school&#39;s part to address these matters whether it&#39;s a student in grade/high school or even college. Students should be inspired to take even more action since peers are key to recognizing things among their own peers. If this was a team effort between fellow students and teachers this can lessen future incidents from happening.This is where schools need to up the ante and make people aware that those who are mentally ill are unpredictable.

This runs along the line of Laurie Dann who was a mentally ill woman then 32 years old who went on a shooting spree and shot up 15 students and two teachers at Hubbard Woods elementary school in Glencoe, Illinois. The media frenzy was so bad that Laurie&#39;s parents had immediately sold their home and relocated to Florida to escape the press who would surround their house to get a response from them. They were at a loss for words because they didn&#39;t think their daughter was capable of doing such a thing until the media revealed that she was a paranoid schizophrenic and a manic depressant.

The Columbine incident should have never happened either and this was due in part that Eric Harris was noted to taking the anti-psychotic medication Luvox as part of his anger management therapy which may have contributed to his psychotic rage most likely a side effect of taking the drug and also after the Marine Corps had rejected him when he applied shortly after his 18th birthday. What makes no real sense is that teachers and counselors at Columbine had been telling the Harris&#39; and the Klebolds for quite some time that their sons were displaying disturbing behavior in their work in school especially their writings and even artwork that was confiscated from them. Then what boils down to it is how you do you go about ignoring what teachers are saying about your child ? How did the parents of these two guys not know they were building bombs in their house something should have tipped off the parents.

What some reports were said is that Dylan and Eric&#39;s parents should have been held fully responsible for seeking appropriate help for their child to address issues that were brought up out of concern by school officials. These parents had to have some idea that something wasnt sitting right when they&#39;re not looking in on them just to check up on them and even prohibiting them from having a computer in their room so they can monitor their activity online since they had created a webpage called Trenchcoat Mafia. This is why parents don&#39;t need to allow their kids to have computers in their rooms and need to keep it in a family room so that children can be monitored at all times. How could they not know that these two were stockpiling weapons and ammunition? That&#39;s just plain ignorance most parents would be searching rooms like a corrections officer doing a random cell search in a prison.

This is what is not clear with parents when they ignore the warning signs of a potential problem when teachers and counselors bring to their attention issues of disturbing behavior. Dylan and Eric were both time bombs ready to go off if this was due in part to the so called teasing, but maybe they may have done something to provoke the things that happened to them? People feel sorry for loners, but do they really get to the bottom of the truth behind their strange behavior. be surprised that the Harris&#39; and the Klebolds haven&#39;t relocated out of Colorado to an undisclosed location to escape the media frenzy. What would it take to stop future incidents like this from happening?

What can colleges and universities do to train their residential education staff to address issues of dorm residents acting bizzare like the guy at Virginia Tech. Resident Advisors need to be trained to spot potentially dangerous behavior in their residents and report this to the school. It shouldn&#39;t get to the point where incidents like this happen for something to be done about it. You have to nip that mess in the bud before it happens so that it not only saves the lives of innocent people who become the target of someone&#39;s anger out of control, but it will also bring increased awareness and security to campuses to protect enrollment status for the colleges and universities.

As a former Resident Advisor I will say to the future RA&#39;s that you need to make it your mission and job to show compassion and caring for your residents because you are in charge of making sure they feel safe and comfortable during their stay on campus. You are also a student leader and a confidant when students come to you with problems whether it&#39;s personal or not. I always told my residents I have an open door policy if they need anything please call or stop by my room. Some RA&#39;s are just in the job because of the perks they get which is free room and board and a stipend that&#39;s paid out through the year.

Some RA&#39;s aren&#39;t true to their jobs or to who they serve and that&#39;s what gives the good RA&#39;s who do their job a bad name and essentially just looking for an opportunity to make their resumes look good. There are times when you need an RA one isnt even around to help you and that&#39;s what frustrates a lot of students especially at big colleges and universities. I had some of the best residents around because some of them were students I had classes with and I talked to them outside of class if something&#39;s up, checked in with them just to let them know someone cares and if they have a problem we sought out the appropriate kind of help and utilized the school counselors if a problem was requiring the professional advice of a social worker or psychologist.

Most of these loners are crying for help if their behavior is turning violent and disturbing. If there&#39;s the fact that the guy behind the Virginia Tech shootings had been making references to Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris as martyrs for what they did during Columbine he&#39;s just a copy cat except he didn&#39;t attempt to hijack a plane to crash it into some major city. This explains that laws surrounding the rights of the mentally ill needs to be changed because some people have more than one type of mental illness which can in fact make them very dangerous. This in turn should make this kind of information readily available to residential education and the counseling department so they can know what students to watch for and if peers around this person begin to talk about changes in behavior or normal routines to take it as something is going on and be on high alert.

This is a hot topic across the board how many more incidents like this do we need to say something has to be done to stop this kind of violence on college and university campuses across the country. What can counselors do when confronting a parent(s) about their child having issues that needs to be addressed. Could the Harris&#39; and Klebolds avoided the mayhem their sons caused had they listened to the people who were trying to tell them their children had some serious issues.

This is going to be a hot topic for a while after the Virginia incident because for someone who clearly had mental illness this needs to be addressed and I am sure the parents of the young man who was involved in this are going to be living with the pain of what happened. I hope the Klebold and Harris families reach out to them to let them know they are not alone and to try and make sense of what drove their sons to do what they did. This is also a pattern too since you see mostly young white males from middle class backgrounds doing this, but this time it changes ethnic background to Asian. We as a society are ones to just sweep things under the rug and when something happens we&#39;re on our soapboxes trying to make sense of the situation.

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Original Source: <a href="http://www.groundreport.com/articles.php?id=2833730">http://www.groundreport.com/articles.php?id=2833730</a>

This work is licensed under a <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/3.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 License</a>.

Nafeesah Abdullah

2007-06-05

Brent Jesiek

Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 License

eng

Va. Tech Shooting: Privacy Laws Are Inhibiting Gun Control Legislation

<a href="http://www.groundreport.com/poetsdream">Ann Clemmons</a>
May 03, 2007

Cho Seung-Hui a tormented young man, already exhibiting crazed behavior, ignored the advice of a teacher, slipped through a mental health care facility, conned campus police, and bought two firearms. Teachers, students, and law enforcement personnel were not able to prevent this tragic event. It seems many people, agencies, and family members were aware of the fact that Cho Seung was "troubled" however, due to the so-called protection of privacy laws; they were unable to help him.

Privacy laws are inhibiting gun control legislation. There is now a bill before congress promoting states to report mental health records to the national database used to conduct background checks on people buying guns. Already federal law prohibits anyone involuntarily admitted as a "mental defective" from purchasing a firearm. However, only twenty-two states provide mental health records to the National Criminal Background Check System. At present, the National Criminal Background Check System, screens people before they can purchase a firearm. However, if states are not required to push mental health care facilities to provide mental health records, for all persons including voluntary commitments, what good is the law doing anyone?

This problem has been going on for years, and gun control advocates, special interest groups, and law enforcement officials have been trying to shed light on the this unpredictable reporting. However, the biggest obstacle has been the privacy law in relation to mental health care records. Evidently, if you are voluntarily committed to a mental health care facility, privacy laws prohibit the facility from reporting your time there.

If Virginia, had required mental health care facilities, to report voluntary records to the National Criminal Background Check, the people who died that day at Va. Tech., would still be alive. Cho Seung-Hui would not have been able to purchase the two firearms that killed thirty-three people, including him. Meaning, Virginia only reported involuntary commitments. Moreover, we do not know for sure when someone approaches the counter in a store, to purchase a firearm, if they have or have not threatened to harm themselves or others. We are in the dark as to whether they have or have not spent time in a mental institution.

In the case of Cho Seung-Hui he had voluntarily gone to St Alban&#39;s, after his involvement in two prior incidents with the police involving two female students. However, since Virginia did not require mental health care facilities too report voluntary commitments, Cho Seung-Hui was able to purchase two firearms. Therefore, someone who rattled off incoherent babble on a video tape, and then sent it to NBC was able to buy not one, but two guns! In fact, after the shootings police investigators were unable to get information about his mental health status, all due to the privacy act. It is no wonder that Cho Seung Hui shared the same characteristics as other school shooters. Privacy laws prevented these characteristics from becoming available to the proper authorities before the shootings took place.

What senseless acts, especially at a time of war, when we are already losing scores of human lives.

After Cho Seung gunned down two people, crossed the street into a classroom, bolted the door to keep help out, and fired two firearms into his fellow students, reaction around the world was that of sadness and outrage. Thirty-three students died that day, including Cho Seung Hui. When are we going to wake up? There are American kids across the world battling terrorism, and more are killed right here in our back yard, due to the American people&#39;s debate over gun control.

Since the first report of this shooting, we have heard urging from other nations on the need for reforming Americas gun control laws, and self -defensive attitude. By not implementing some changes in American policy and culture, we will earn more than the right to bear arms. We will also earn the right to bear unspeakable pain and sorrow, consequences that follow the lack of proper procedures in place to protect our citizens from the improper use of firearms.

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Original Source: Ground Report
<a href="http://www.groundreport.com/articles.php?id=2833707">http://www.groundreport.com/articles.php?id=2833707</a>

This work is licensed under a <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/">Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License</a>.

Ann Clemmons

2007-06-05

Brent Jesiek

Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License

eng

Today We Are All Hokies

Wednesday, April 18. 2007

The blog has not been on my mind these past few days. My son is a senior at Virginia Tech. He&#39;s OK. We have spent most of the past two days staying in touch with him and answering phone calls and emails from friends and family.

I watched the coverage knowing he was safe, and saw his freshman dormitory as the site of the first shooting, and his main classroom building as the site of the others. I&#39;ve walked that campus, gone to football games, chanted Hokie chants, been in those buildings, and still I can&#39;t grasp what it must be to be that community.

He called his mom as soon as he knew about the first shootings. He had a class in Norris Hall at 10:30 and planned to be there at 9:30 to work on his senior project. Professor Kevin Granata was their project adviser in the Engineering Science and Mechanics department. Their research is in muscle and reflex response and robotics. Dr. Granata is one of the top biomechanics researchers in the country and is known for his work on movement dynamics in cerebral palsy.

If he had gone in as planned, he would have been exactly at the wrong place at the wrong time. Dr. Granata was one of the thirty in Norris Hall that was killed.

I&#39;ve been on the Tech campus a number of times, gone to a Hokie football game and have a sense of this spirit you hear students and staff talk about on the news. But I don&#39;t think we can understand it in the way that they do.

The students and staff I saw on the news all served Tech well. The professors who were killed all died trying to protect their students in some way. They serve our profession well.

I listened to poet Nikki Giovanni at the Convocation read "<a href="http://americaabroad.tpmcafe.com/blog/oldengoldendecoy/2007/apr/17/nikki_giovanni_we_are_virginia_tech">We Are Virginia Tech</a>" and thought that some listeners must have thought it odd for a poet to talk about "We are Hokies." I would have thought the same before my son started Tech. I associated Hokies with sports, especially football, and the overwhelming volume of fans at the stadium. But it is more than that. When the students chanted "Let&#39;s Go Hokies" or just the word Hokie, that too must have seemed odd, perhaps irreverent, to some given the circumstances. It absolutely was not that.

I work on a college campus and know that it could happen at any school. I have no wise healing words, no poem of my own, no pointing finger of blame or visionary hindsight.

<i>"We are better than we think,
not quite what we want to be.
We are alive
to the imagination
and the possibility
we will continue
to invent the future
through our blood and tears,
through all this sadness.
We are the Hokies.
We will prevail,
we will prevail.
We are Virginia Tech."</i>

Posted by <a href="http://devel2.njit.edu/serendipity/index.php?/authors/1-Ken-Ronkowitz">Ken Ronkowitz</a> in <a href="http://devel2.njit.edu/serendipity/index.php?/categories/3-About-Us">About Us</a> at <a href="http://devel2.njit.edu/serendipity/index.php?/archives/303-Today-We-Are-All-Hokies.html">07:38</a>

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Original Source: <a href="http://devel2.njit.edu/serendipity/index.php?/archives/303-Today-We-Are-All-Hokies.html">http://devel2.njit.edu/serendipity/index.php?/archives/303-Today-We-Are-All-Hokies.html</a>

Licensed under <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/1.0/">Creative Commons Attribution 1.0</a>.

Ken Ronkowitz

2007-06-03

Brent Jesiek

Creative Commons Attribution 1.0

eng

Broken heart&#39;s here at Virginia Tech

Apr 18th, 2007 by <a href="http://ryanlanham.wordpress.com/author/ryanlanham/">Ryan Lanham</a>

This day, two days after the shootings at Virginia Tech, is a day of broken hearts. The eyes of those who love the place realize it is now defined...like Kent State, like Columbine, as a tragic event, particularly for most people outside the immediate community.

That set of moments will always be...a where were you when...time. It is now the historical event of tours and commentators fifty years hence. The shooter has ensured his fame as a parting shot of narcissism.

My boss and mentor has given over 30 years to the campus from a time when it was a sleepy state school that charged $18 a credit hour, or something like that, to helping it grow into a research institution of international note. It breaks my heart to see the heartbreak in his eyes. His love of the place helps me help him in his work; his disappointment and sadness magnify my own. In some ways to see his disappointment is almost the worst of it for me. I was in his office, locked in behind two doors but near enough to open windows to hear gun shots, as the whole crisis unfolded. He was, as usual, fatherly and wise. I could not help but wonder if his leadership at the moment of crisis might have made a difference.

But so far as I can tell there are no lessons in any of this. The whole thing appears startlingly random. Gun ownership is falling rather rapidly in the United States and it would be utterly impossible to achieve any legislative gain on the issue in the face of those who are its advocates and protectors.

The student was a loner who had troubling fantasies, but that would only put him amongst maybe 15% of his peers (at least). I heard today at a press conference that 7-30% of the student body is seen for counselling in the course of a year. Mental health is a real issue, and this fellow wasn&#39;t even really in the system like 10s of thousands of other college students.

The university probably didn&#39;t act perfectly, but who would have? And second guessing such a singular event seems work I am uninterested in...it was a windy, colder Monday morning at this huge institution with thousands of drivers and issues in play. Mishandled? Well, in such an environment everything is probably mishandled in one way or another. I can&#39;t see great error from what I have heard. The flow of better information seems to be the best and consistent lesson learned from most crises I have been involved with (including this one). Could there have been some sort of electronic locking system or metal doors on each classroom? Should we have had a texting system? Who can say?

The press has been omnipresent but mostly respectful, I&#39;d judge. Only some of them seem to be the ghoulish dirty laundry sorts. Still, mourning is difficult in their presence. Consequently, the environment is more surreal than mournful so far. The husk of the Norris building sits nearby to where I write this. Police come and go wiping the sweat from their heads. They too seem distressed at the magnitude of the crime scene. The one Virginia Tech police officer I spoke briefly to...in order to thank him...had a sort of look as if he were ashamed not more could be done. I don&#39;t think I was misreading him...something combining shame and fatigue ran over his face. To my mind there is no need for shame...far from it. I know of no one who expected more from these folks. They did not resolve the crisis, but they acted and responded doing their best. That alone took great courage especially after two security/police deaths in this small town within the year.

The young son of the Blacksburg Rescue Squad chief came briefly to my house to play with my children yesterday. The woman watching him said his parents "needed a break." I know the father fairly well and went camping with him once. He&#39;s a tough and internalized guy. I have thought about his cleaning up those bodies several times. How do you absorb that? I find my mind drifting to questions of who will have to clean up the floors and the walls. Will janitors face that? How long will blood drops be found here or there...under a desk. It seems to me you have to sort of start afresh with it. Empty it. Maybe even close the building. Why do I think about those things? I also cannot help but think of other disaster sites. There was a movie on HBO not long ago on the Tsunami in Thailand that touched on these unspeakable topics. It was engaging because those human issues...not the usual press garbage, was addressed.
Many families are about on campus. I&#39;m not sure how people are staying here. The hotels must be packed. There must be tens of thousands of people who aren&#39;t from here milling around. The camera crews and reporters alone must be into the thousands.

Less than $1,000 worth of guns and bullets. A few chains and locks. And maybe 3 hours of insanity. Not only many lives changed or destroyed, but a place defined and branded. The only sense is one of heartbreak.

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Original Source: <a href="http://ryanlanham.wordpress.com/2007/04/18/broken-heart/">http://ryanlanham.wordpress.com/2007/04/18/broken-heart/</a>

Licensed under <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported</a>.

Ryan Lanham

2007-06-03

Brent Jesiek

Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported

eng

Virginia Tech - Personal Update for Ryan and his family

Apr 16th, 2007 by <a href="http://ryanlanham.wordpress.com/author/ryanlanham/">Ryan Lanham</a>

For those who know I am at Virginia Tech, both my family and myself are accounted for and uninvolved in any way in the shooting.

Local sources (channel 7) report 22 dead. (see update below...now at least 31...)

I was in Burruss Hall and heard gunshots at approximately 10AM.

I spoke with one associate who reported having to evacuate Norris by stepping past or over a fatality.

I have no other first-hand information other than to report that both my family and myself are safe.

Update:

The worst shooting incident in American history apparently occurred within earshot of my office. When we had huddled in my boss Minnis Ridenour&#39;s office, we heard gun shots around 10AM.

The tragedy is obviously considerable. People I know well are reporting on national and international news.

My neighbors and friends who are EMTs treated the wounded both from the 7:15AM dorm shooting and from Norris. For local friends, Sue O. was at the Burger King doing triage. The schools locked down early and people on campus acted admirably.

We are, here in Blacksburg, VA, some 40 miles from the nearest small commercial airport at Roanoke, VA. To have something occur like this in a place of rural beauty at a campus that is quite closely knit and exceedingly friendly seems truly random in the most shocking sort of way.

My thoughts are with the families of those injured and dead.

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Original Source: <a href="http://ryanlanham.wordpress.com/2007/04/16/virginia-tech-personal-update/">http://ryanlanham.wordpress.com/2007/04/16/virginia-tech-personal-update/</a>

Licensed under <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported</a>.

Ryan Lanham

2007-06-03

Brent Jesiek

Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported

eng

Why I Participated in the One Day Blog Silence

<p>I chose to participate in the <a href="http://two-perfect.blogspot.com/2007/04/one-day-blog-silence.html">One Day Blog Silence</a>. There are much worse, but less publicized violence and prejudice daily, so I have spent the one day blog silence in honor of all victims of injustice around the world. The silence day was started to honor those who died at the <a href="http://two-perfect.blogspot.com/2007/04/virginia-tech-shooting-updates.html">Virginia Tech Massacre</a>. Sadly, it has been the most controversial issue I have seen within the blogosphere.</p>
<p>Why do we argue whether or not to participate? First of all, we all intend to honor those who were killed. Is it not possible to do so in our own ways, without having to argue what the best way is? I don&#39;t care in what way you do it, as long as you stand against injustice, I definitely agree with you.</p>
<p>Further, some say that silence isn&#39;t the best way to honor the dead. First of all, what do you do at funerals? Your mourn, then you move on. Moreover, what action do you plan on taking? We can speak out; I&#39;ve already posted about <a href="http://two-perfect.blogspot.com/2007/04/preventing-hatred-and-animosity.html">abolishing animosity</a>. But further than that, we have little power to change much of the law, let alone drastically change other countries. So if you think of an alternative, that isn&#39;t too idealistic, I wish to take part. For the meantime do what you gotta do. In my case, I chose to share my thoughts and spend a day in silence.</p>
<blockquote>Man&#8217;s inability to live God&#8217;s words makes the Avatar&#8217;s teaching a mockery. Instead of practicing the compassion he taught, man has waged wars in his name. Instead of living the humility, purity, and truth of his words, man has given way to hatred, greed, and violence. Because man has been deaf to the principles and precepts laid down by God in the past, in this present Avataric form, I observe silence. - <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silence_Day">Silence Day</a></blockquote>
<blockquote>Please understand my reasons for not speaking today. I am participating in the Day of Silence, a national youth movement protesting the silence faced by lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people and their allies in schools. My deliberate silence echoes that silence, which is caused by harassment, prejudice, and discrimination. I believe that ending the silence is the first step toward fighting these injustices. Think about the voices you are not hearing today. What are you going to do to end the silence? - <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Day_of_silence#Events">Day of Silence</a></blockquote>
<p>Of course this is a hypocritical post. I am arguing that using Silence is not futile. But I am mainly doing this to defend why I personally chose to participate, and to explain why I don&#39;t think it is foolish.</p>
<p>A secondary reason against the One Day Blog Silence is a claim that it is a scam. People do everything for money, much like what&#39;s happening to <a href="http://two-perfect.blogspot.com/2007/04/religion-losing-meaning.html">Relgion</a>. However I don&#39;t think anyone would step that low to use the deaths of 30 students for personal gain. If there was someone, then there&#39;s really nothing we can do now. If this does turn out to be a scam, and that the website is redirected in the future, then whoever did this was incredibly stupid. People will know exactly where the links redirect to, and will most likely speak against that website.</p>
<p>Just my thoughts. I don&#39;t want you to say that spending a day in silence was right. I would just like you to acknowledge that it wasn&#39;t wrong either. <b><i>Do what you gotta do. I don&#39;t care in what way you do it, as long as you stand against injustice, I definitely agree with you.</i></b></p>
<p>Posted by 2Perfect on <a href="http://two-perfect.blogspot.com/2007/04/why-i-participated-in-one-day-blog.html">5/01/2007 12:10:00 AM</a></p>
<p>--</p>
<p>Original Source: <a href="http://two-perfect.blogspot.com/2007/04/why-i-participated-in-one-day-blog.html">http://two-perfect.blogspot.com/2007/04/why-i-participated-in-one-day-blog.html</a></p>
<p>Licensed under <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/ca/">Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Canada</a>.</p>

2Perfect / BJ Nodora

2007-06-03

Brent Jesiek

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Canada

eng

Virginia Tech Tragedy: A Revealing Sociological Tome

about 1 month ago by Nate Brugnone

The recent shootings at Virginia Tech are not only a tragedy at face-value, they are also a revealing tragedy on many social levels. As this story broke almost every headline across the US, and no doubt throughout much of the world, it&#39;s become apparent to me how much journalism today resembles a botch theatrical moral auction.

It&#39;s a "who can draw the most hits using the most visceral, emotive attractor" competition. First come the alligators of the shallow, murky riverbanks. These are the fat lizard spawn of necessary 24-hour news corporations -- the ones with catlike reflexes and the largest paychecks. They&#39;re bug-eyes keep a most sentinel vigil over "normalcy" amongst the crowd. Even the slightest ripple caused by a ubiquitous herbivore hoof could spell a ratings spike and a big payoff. And I&#39;m not just going to roll over here and give them the credit of, "[in a whiny, airy Bob Saget voice] well, they just want to get us the news we need to know about. They&#39;re looking out for us." If that&#39;s the case, then I&#39;m severely deluded as to the nature of mass media in the US and Rupert Murdock (or whomever) has a proportional messiah-complex. We know, at least considering the second statement, that this is untrue.

Covering the rest of Noah&#39;s Ark here, we come to the wolves in peacocks&#39; feathers -- the journalists who find it necessary to employ visual aids, as if the headline, "33 College Students Slaughtered in Largest Killing Spree in US History," doesn&#39;t tweak tightly enough the heart muscles and gray matter of the soon-to-be-touched-upon emotional-parasites. "Here&#39;s a picture a bloodied boy barely clinging to life as he is carried out by fellow scholars." Blah blah blah... on & on.

Then in come the dumpster-diving raccoon collage artists, riding the coattails of those before, pasting, quoting other papers, quoting bloggers (dah!), in hopes of making a few more bucks. These things smell and are super lazy. Just look at the abundance of this type of roadkill for one week. Its prominence it staggering.

And the saddest of all, just our collective attention is turned furthest from the topic, we have monkeys parachuting into football stadiums with a sanctified howl of political co-opting. It used to annoy me to no end when someone called George Bush a monkey and blamed him for something he probably had no direct hand in, but after this ringmaster bit at VT I can say the man has no moral fiber of his own and is nothing more than the flaccid remnants of a fraternity kegger ... thus making him a monkey... er, something to that extent.

Now it feels like I&#39;m done here with this topic, but I can feel something; some animal has been overlooked. Ah, yes. The very foundation on which all the rest of these rely: <i>Heliactin bilopha</i>, the Horned Sungem. No bird flaps its wings faster and therefore no bird is more fickle. There are over 6 billion inhabiting the globe. Each determines which flowers shall bloom next year and the year after and so on. No single bird sees itself as the essential part of this zoo as it can freely and discriminately drink nectar from wherever it may choose...

I find it odd and also telling that year after year the same flowers come into bloom. We&#39;re interesting creatures...

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Original Source: <a href="http://dormitem.com/blog/95">http://dormitem.com/blog/95</a>

Licensed under <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/us/">Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States</a>.

Nate Brugnone

2007-06-02

Brent Jesiek

Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States

eng

In Cho&#39;s defence...

Saturday, April 21, 2007

<i>"this is a lesson for all o. i think those American parents should learn a lesson or 2 from this. with the way their kids tease other people of different nationalities. i went to school abroad as well, and i can tell you that most people, even the adult students have no regard for others. if you aint speaking the language like them, or don&#39;t look like them, its hard to mix. i&#39;m not generalizing, but its a pattern ive noticed. hence it leaves people feeling isolated from others. i think people should be taught these subtle signs and not to ignore others. no be by force, but at least make an effort to make other people feel welcome. this matter was a big issue in the school i went to. if you aint white, forget it. no-one wants to have anything to do with you, no matter how extroverted or social you are."</i> <b>- Soulpatrol (Nairaland)</b>

Being a foreigner myself set me thingking... what could have made a man shoot 31 innocent people before taking his own life?

It&#39;s easy to plant flowers at memorials, write words we don&#39;t mean on tombstones and whiteboards, talk about how good people were on facebook. . . if only we did this when we each could appreciate each other perhaps such episodes could be a thiing of the past. How could a fellow not have any friends for 4 years?? Everyone is talking about him being the weird kid who never talked, some are busy posting his plays on the internet, professors are describing a disturbed kid they think they did a huge favour by sending to see a psychiatrist. Where was everyone when a simple "how did your day go" would have averted this problem?

How many times was Cho abandoned in the back of the class with everyone sniggering at that "weird asian kid who never talked"? I find it so difficult to imagine me sharing a room with another individual and him having issues that warranted psychiatric evaluation and police questioning and yet doing absolutely nothing! Only to appear on CNN after the shootings to hug the limelights as the room mates of a weirdo!!!

His family never visited and no one cared to ask why. He never went on holidays and no one bothered to invite him home even when they lived just a stone&#39;s throw from the school. He wrote scary plays and his classmates prefered to turn them into discussion points rather than reach out to someone who was clearly troubled. How many times do we push people away because they don&#39;t look like us, talk like us or think like us? How many times have we been so ignorant and selfish forgetting to help those around us who need just one person to make them feel loved and accepted? It is easy to talk about healing, fly flags at halfmast, cancel school, while pretending to honor the memories of those that died when we are merely reaping the fruits of our selfishness, rejection of others and inability to stretch a hand of fellowship.

Of course this in no way attempts to justify Cho&#39;s act but it is a reminder to us that there are thousands of other Cho&#39;s around us. They may never pick up a gun and shoot their classmates but deep inside are living a life that is empty. Luxury can never take the place of love and acceptance, if one person cared for his neighbour perhaps much more than stricter gun laws, we may be able to save someone else from going the lonely road to perdition.

I wonder what would have happened to Cho had he not carried out his act. Many of us leave college with healthy memories that would linger forever. What would Cho have left with?

posted by david at 11:29 PM

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Original Source: <a href="http://davidylan.blogspot.com/2007/04/in-chos-defence.html">http://davidylan.blogspot.com/2007/04/in-chos-defence.html</a>

Licensed under <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.5/">Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5</a>.

David Adenuga

2007-06-02

Brent Jesiek

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5

eng