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

Cho Seung

<b>Artist&#39;s Comments</b>

Image made for the newspaper I work at (Nyhedsavisen). Asking questions like "was the evil or just haunted? Was it something in his head or the society around him?"

Kinda funny... A few months ago this was a guy I&#39;d never ever have a chance to even know. And now I&#39;m actually drawing him. Amazing what killing some people will get you.

The media said he had no feelings, but I think he had too many of them.

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Provided courtesy of Riana M&#248;ller, <a href="http://www.fealasy.com/">http://www.fealasy.com/</a>

Original Source: <a href="http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/55107879/">http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/55107879/</a>

Riana M&#248;ller

2007-06-04

Brent Jesiek

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

News Worthiness

Thursday, April 19, 2007

Since releasing the excerpts from the package sent by Virginia Tech killer Cho Seung-Hui, NBC News has received more than just a little criticism. Indeed, this story is so big that every little nuance... anything remotely connected to the story is being put under a microscope and reported on <i>ad nauseam</i>. Ironically enough, the decision to air the material delivered to NBC News has become itself a news story.

If not for the "gift" left by Cho, the media would be filling all of that airtime and every available inch with anything and everything it could discover about this "seriously disturbed individual." Cho saved the media a huge amount of legwork and opened insights about what drove him. Did he get what he wanted? Some are saying that by airing this "manifesto," Cho has ultimately won.

But think about how ridiculous that sounds. Cho is dead - and he&#39;s not getting any better. Last I checked, to get any enjoyment or satisfaction from an act, one must be alive to experience it. Furthermore, even if Cho could somehow relish his media spotlight from the grave, he would soon realize that no one agrees that he was any kind of victim. He would be crestfallen in the discovery that he is being regarded - at best - as "a seriously disturbed young man." Mostly he&#39;s being viewed as some kind of homicidal whacko.

For those with a religious leaning, I&#39;m guessing that Cho&#39;s last act earned him a one-way ticket straight to Hell. Do not pass go, do not collect $200. Yet he is somehow enjoying the last laugh? I don&#39;t think so. Does this coverage intensify the pain of the community, the survivors and the victims&#39; families? Undoubtedly, but surely they would understand that news of this magnitude must be reported. Even without Cho&#39;s help, there would be extensive coverage of Cho - a disproportionate amount.

But even without considering the civic responsibility of the news business, let us remember that it is a business. If no one tuned into this stuff, no one would report it. People want to know, despite how much they say they don&#39;t. The numbers don&#39;t lie. Did NBC and others overdo it? Was there more coverage of Cho&#39;s package than "necessary?" That&#39;s a matter of opinion and judgment. But to say that NBC had a responsibility to quash this information is nonsense. They have a responsibility to report it.

It&#39;s a tough job, but someone&#39;s got to do it.

Posted by Mr. Althouse at 5:30 PM

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Original Source: <a href="http://25yearplan.blogspot.com/2007/04/news-worthiness.html">http://25yearplan.blogspot.com/2007/04/news-worthiness.html</a>

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

Michael Althouse

2007-06-02

Brent Jesiek

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5

eng

Now You Have Blood On Your Hands That Will Never Come Off

Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Cho Seung-Hui, a 23-year-old senior majoring in English at Virginia <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/virginia+tech">Tech</a>, has completed his transformation from Clark Kent to, well, Rambo. Having killed and maimed over thirty people, in a calculated and merciless way, he has shown another facet of evil and pain to the world. Alone, bitter, unhappy and insane, his sad story reverberates on several levels.

Is it better to have stricter gun control, or have more guns in the hands of law abiding people to protect themselves? Have privacy laws and rights for the mentaly disabled gone too far, or should involuntary committment for treatment be easier to order? Has community and the support of family been destroyed by the cheapening of our culture, or has the stigma of needing help become so great that those most in need shun it?

There were heros at Virgina Tech - Professor Lucinda Roy, who tried so hard to get Mr. Cho the help he so badly needed; another Professor, Liviu Librescu, a 76 year old Holocaust survivor who gave his life offering his body as a shield for his students; during the aftermath the poet, Nikki Giovanni, leading students in a cheer to affirm that they will survive and be stronger - &#39;We are HOKIES!&#39;.

<i>But there is one party who will not be a hero during all this</i>, and that is the National Broadcasting Company news organization. After Mr. <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/cho">Cho</a> shot his first two victims in his dormitory, he made a rambling videotape with his jeremiad on debauched rich students and how they had driven him to this action, shortly before he entered a classroom, chained the doors shut and killed thirty more people. This insane person took the time to film and mail his video between murders, and <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/nbc">NBC</a> chose to make it public.

Poor Dylan Klebold - he never thought of making videos before killing his classmates at Columbine High School. Now, Mr. Cho has created a new item in the iconography of mass murder, one that we will surely see again. We have come a long way from the days when shooting Ronald Reagan to impress Jodie Foster was a ticket to fifteen minutes of fame and becoming an answer on a Trivial Pursuit card. Now we present a news network with 27 videos, 43 photographs and an 1,800-word narration described as "multimedia manifesto" from a "uniquely sick mind." NBC was quick to turn the package over to the FBI, right after making copies for itself.

Mr. Cho could be speaking to NBC when he observes, "You had 100 billion chances and ways to have avoided today, but you decided to spill my blood. You forced me into a corner and gave me only one option. The decision was yours. Now, you have blood on your hands that will never wash off." By choosing to give this presentation the validation of a platform, NBC has sent our nation and our heritage just one more step down a dank and violent road.

Update: From &#39;Below the Beltway&#39;, an informative tribute by Doug Mataconis about <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/librescu">Prof.</a> <a href="http://belowthebeltway.com/2007/04/20/a-hero-laid-to-rest/">Liviu Librescu</a>

posted by Peter Porcupine at 9:07 PM

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Original Source: <a href="http://capecodporcupine.blogspot.com/2007/04/now-you-have-blood-on-your-hands-that.html">http://capecodporcupine.blogspot.com/2007/04/now-you-have-blood-on-your-hands-that.html</a>

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

Peter Porcupine

2007-06-02

Brent Jesiek

Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 2.5 License

eng

Seung Cho and what I know

I was in his playwriting class last fall. I was always a quiet guy myself, not really making too many friends during my years at Virginia Tech. On a couple of occasions, we&#39;d end up sitting close to each other. I had always thought that Cho was a little "off" but since I was strange in my own right, I didn&#39;t think too much of it. People like Cho and I never seem to make friends easily and the fact that we were both loners of sorts made me pay a little more attention to him that usual.

Just before Christmas I passed by Seung Cho while he was walking around the Drill Field, a little more sad-looking than usual. I offered him a cigarette which he refused with a wave of his hand. I then tried to talk to him about one of the plays we had recently reviewed in class and he finally started talking a little. We talked about the plot and the characters when suddenly Cho asked me what others had thought about his "Richard McBeef" story.

It was then that I told Seung Cho that some of the others in the class were a little concerned with his writing. Seung seemed to get a kick out of that because he suddenly had a smile where only a grin existed before. I told him that some people were talking about him before class, talking about he was a little strange acting and with this play of his, some other students joked about him being a charter member of the trenchcoat mafia. Cho wondered what that was, so I told him about the whole Littleton, Colorado school shooting. He seemed intrigued by my words. We talked a little more about "sticking it to the man" and how good it feels to break things sometimes. I used to steal cars and smash them into buildings, Seung mentioned he liked to hurt things. I didn&#39;t ask anymore questions.

After that day I thought differently about Seung-Hui Cho. I thought I might read about him in the paper one day, and not for any good reason.

And then it happened. All over the news. School shooting at Virginia Tech. My first thoughts when my mother called and asked me if I was okay was, " I wonder if it was Cho?!" After getting off the phone with my mom, I smiled a little knowing that Cho had gotten what he wanted. Revenge.

Cho Seung-Hui has gone and done what many of us "loners" only wish we had the courage do to. I too have often thought of taking my anger out on innocents, but unlike Seung Cho, I just don&#39;t have the courage to pull the trigger. He did.

I feel bad for the victims, but not too much. Perhaps people will start paying closer attention to us loners before we end up making ourselves popular, for all the wrong reasons!

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Original Source: <a href="http://thestoriesyoucannottell.blogspot.com/2007/04/seung-cho-and-what-i-know.html">http://thestoriesyoucannottell.blogspot.com/2007/04/seung-cho-and-what-i-know.html</a>

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

null

2007-06-02

Brent Jesiek

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5

eng

Cho Seung-Hui's Memorial

Text of Note #1:

Seung-Hui

I hope that if I ever meet anyone like you I will have the courage and strength to reach out and change his or her life for the better.

I hope your family is able to get through the misery they are in because of you.

I hope the damage you inflicted on so many lives is healed soon and never repeated.

I hope the anger towards you that resides in so many hearts turns to forgiveness.

I hope the earthly troubles of all 33 of you are a fleeting distant memory.

Pax,
David

Original source: <a href=" http://www.flickr.com/photos/maxpower/468742551/"> http://www.flickr.com/photos/maxpower/468742551/</a>

Licensed under <a href=" http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/">Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0</a>

Max Power

2007-05-25

Chad Newswander

Permission
Contact: Max Power
(http://www.flickr.com/photos/maxpower/468742551/)
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0

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Question Mark by artistm0nk

<b>Artist&#39;s Comments</b>

?

Lay me on the ground
Fly me in the sky
Show me where to look
Tell me what will I find...
Teach me how to speak
Teach me how to share
Teach me where to go
Tell me will love be there
Will love be there?

- Shine by Collective Soul


This is <b>Seung-hui Cho</b> aka "Question Mark", the gunman of the Virginia Tech Massacre.

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Original submitted to deviantart.com on April 24, 2007: <a href="http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/53906656/">http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/53906656/</a>

Licensed under a <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.5/">Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 License</a>.

Aletheia Rio ("Artistmonk")

2007-05-24

Brent Jesiek

reative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5

eng