The bell rang 32 times
description: A ceremony held on the first day of class after the tragedy in which one balloon is released for each victim. Original source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/spector1/sets/72157600104116028/ Photo Courtesy of Roger Gupta
creator: Roger Gupta
date: 2007-06-05
contributor: Chad Newswander
language: eng

The Burrus Hall
description: A banner from Anderson University, on display in front of Burruss Hall, reads "We are all Hokies today as we share in your grief, may God grant you strength for the dark days ahead, solace for your pain and suffering, and courage for a brighter tomorrow."
creator: Jinfeng Jiao
date: 2007-08-14
contributor: Na Mi
language: eng

The challenge of preventing violence is not just an American problem
description: Commentary John Monahan and Jeffrey Swanson Sunday April 22, 2007 The Observer One of the largest mass killings in American history was carried out last Monday at the hands of a 23-year-old university student with mental illness. The reverberations of the events that ended the lives of 32 students and faculty staff at Virginia Tech - and of the offender as well - are shaking the already wobbly mental health system. This American tragedy surely holds lessons for the UK as it considers the revision of its Mental Health Bill. The scientific challenges of predicting violence, and the legal challenges of preventing it, transcend national borders. Both UK and US look first to mental health professionals. But how good are psychiatrists and psychologists at distinguishing which people with a mental illness will be violent? Research shows professionals are better than pure chance, but not much. Predicting harmful behaviour is like predicting bad weather. An inaccurate prediction doesn't necessarily mean the clinician or the meteorologist has 'missed something'; it may just mean the science of forecasting has a long way to go. Tools to aid mental health professionals in the task focus on proven risk factors: characteristics that define the person (e.g. young, male); disorders that a person has (e.g. a major mental illness, a personality disorder, and alcohol or drug abuse); what the person has done (e.g. past violence); and what has been done to the person (e.g. being raised by violent or substance abusing parents, and being physically abused as a child). These risk factors can distinguish patients with a low risk of future violence from patients with a high one. What can be done to preclude anticipated violence? If people need treatment, don't want it, and might do something harmful if they don't get it, can the state override their right to refuse? The law of civil commitment - being hospitalised against one's will - in almost every US state focuses on two things: whether t…
creator: John Monahan and Jeffrey Swanson
date: 2007-08-12
contributor: Adriana Seagle
rights: In consideration of the fee of GBP 0.00 ("the Fee") Guardian News & Media Limited ("GNM") grants the Licensee the right to: publish on its website for 10 years. Contact info: Eve Thompson;permissions.syndication@guardian.co.uk
language: eng

The forest for the trees
description: Letters to the Editor The forest for the trees Tragedy struck at Virginia Tech Monday. Unfortunately, the sadness of events is not only in the actions themselves, but also in the reactions. I want to assert that we still need to keep an eye on the forest while inspecting the trees. Reporter after reporter fired questions, and I use the term fired here for a reason, at Virginia Tech Police Chief Flinchum, about security policy. The officer looked visibly shaken, dismayed, saddened and reporters piled on frustration as he tried to deal with the condescending questions from the gallery. Now, let's be clear. Was the reaction as good as it could have been? Of course not. Was it even good? It doesn't appear that it was. But let me say this. I'll bet that if you poll anyone who went to college after1999 (Columbine), you'll find that over 85 percent of the students have or had no idea of any kind of "lockdown policy." As a recent University graduate, I can't even tell you what the school's hurricane policy is. But here is where we're missing the point yet again. The problem here isn't campussecurity. Chief Flinchum didn't kill anyone. The Virginia Tech police didn't harm anyone. The problem yet again is gun control. As we approach the eight year anniversary of the tragedy at Columbine, what has happened since? To truncate the depressingly long list of school shootings, I'll just focus on Virginia colleges. In 2002, the Appalachian School of Law was the site of a tragedy where a dean and fellow student were killed by a student. Two of these shootings in five years in the same state at college campuses exemplifies the problem we're facing as a nation. So what's the real problem here? Is it security? Is it emergency response? Of course not. If people want to commit crimes, people will commit crimes. The problem is that when they want to commit these crimes, access to weapons with which to commit these crimes is tragic. What's the answer? If we continue missing the forest for t…
creator: Aaron Schmidt
publisher: The Cavalier Daily
date: 2007-07-31
contributor: Sara Hood
rights: Meggie Bonner <meggiebonner@gmail.com>
language: eng

The game is over
description: Players come in from the field after the game. Photo by George Norton.
creator: George Norton
date: 2008-04-21
contributor: Kacey Beddoes
rights: "Norton, George" <gnorton@vt.edu>
language: eng

The Hierarchy of Evil
description: April 26, 2007 By CLAIRE ST. AMANT Staff writer Even in the Garden of Eden, questions of evil abounded. Thousands of years later, we are still wrestling with the issue of depravity and the nature of evil. The tragedy at Virginia Tech University is the latest reminder of the human capacity to act in ways that harm others. Two psychiatrists, Dr. Michael Stone of Columbia College of Physicians and Surgeons, and Dr. Michael Welner, a forensic psychiatrist at New York School of Medicine, are developing systems to rank evil deeds according to degrees of heinousness. Both scales have implications for the legal system. Welner hopes his scale on depravity will be used as a guideline in criminal sentencing, and Stone's 22-level hierarchy of evil is based on biographies of violent offenders. Dr. Daryl Koehn, author of The Nature of Evil and chairwoman of business ethics at the University of St. Thomas in Houston, said she believes it's dangerous to rank evil behavior. "It seems to me that the ranking system would say that the people themselves are more evil and not the acts they are committing," Koehn said. "I think it will make us see some people as monsters and completely unlike us." "I don't believe Cho (Seung-Hui) was a monster," she said. "I think it's a mistake to see him as motivated by malice." Koehn said we're all "caught up in the same dynamics" of good and evil and are guilty of "identifying with a false self and trying to transfer our pain to others." When we suffer in some way -- physically, emotionally or otherwise -- we become frustrated and react in different ways, she said. Koehn offered the example of road rage as one modern expression of frustration. "The false self tells us we are a nobody," she said. "In some ways we are all trying to transfer that pain." Becky Robertson, a George W. Truett Theological Seminary student from the Ivory Coast, said the universal guilt of humankind manifests itself in different ways. "We have a natural tendency to say, 'I told…
creator: CLAIRE ST. AMANT
date: 2007-10-02
contributor: Haeyong Chung
language: eng

The Hokie Nation Stood
description: The Hokie Nation Stood On a cold April morning A shock went through the campus Two of their number were gone The Hokie Nation woke up Hours later, as the leaders tried To make sense of what was happening Word came of more tragedy The Hokie Nation came to its feet Throughout the day and into the night They stood with each other for support They stood by around the world waiting for news The Hokie Nation stood together The next day They were standing in the Cassell and in the Lane They were standing with candles on the Drill Field The Hokie Nation was standing firm They stood to remember those who were no longer among them They stood to console to those who suffered They stood to show the world The Hokie Nation will always stand Decades from now The April morning will be a few lines in a history book The pain of the memorials will have faded The Hokie Nation will still be standing SKS - VT'78 April 18, 2007
creator: Stuart Sutphin
date: 2007-05-07
contributor: Stuart Sutphin
language: eng

The Ides of April
description: Waco, TX. Oklahoma City, OK. Columbine, CO. Blacksburg, VA. Fifteen years ago, a person could have looked at those four cities and wondered why they have been grouped together. None of these places had anything in common. Most people might not even have heard of three of those cities, save for people that live in those states. April 19, 1993. April 19, 1995. April 20, 1999. April 16, 2007. Fifteen years ago, a person could have looked at those four dates and wondered why they have been grouped together. None of these dates could have possibly had any future significance, save for the fact that they would all occur within the same calendar week. Fifteen years. Such a small window in the grand scheme of things we call time. Julius Caesar was told by the Soothsayer to "Beware the Ides of March." Perhaps the third week in this month should be called the "Ides of April." All four tragedies have occurred within the same calendar week, the third week of April. These events helped shape - or scar - today's society. To be sitting here, writing about the worst shooting in United States history, is almost surreal. It goes along with events like the Kennedy assassination, the Challenger space shuttle, and September 11th. People will ask you years from now, "Where were you that day?" Almost regrettably, my answer will be, "Across the street from West AJ." I remember sitting in my dorm room my senior year in college, waking up to see that the World Trade Center had fallen and the Pentagon had been stuck by terrorists. I recall the sense of anger, so much so that my hands were shaking. A sense of utter disbelief ran wild through my head for days as I sat glued to the television newscasts. I felt a need for vengeance, a need for retribution. Our troops took care of that for us, and are still fighting nearly six years later. As I sat through today's event in Blacksburg, all I could think of was that this is how the story ends. There will be no revenge, no retribution, no release fro…
creator: Landon Owen
date: 2007-06-01
contributor: Landon Owen
language: eng

The intangible bond between two broken hearts
description: The post title isn't an exact quote (because it would've been damn hard taking notes while trying to hold a lit candle (and, more importantly, given the windy conditions this evening, keeping it lit) from the remarks of NIU President John G. Peters at tonight's candlelight vigil at Northern Illinois University to honor the memory of the Hokies who lost their lives a year ago today. But they're a close approximation: I know he used both phrases in his speech, though I can't swear that they were that closely connected. Nevertheless, it's a good description for the relationship that will forevermore exist between our two campuses, our two communities. We're both members of a club that nobody wants to join--and would to God that NIU and Virginia Tech were the last two ever given the opportunity to join it. We speak each other's language: a language that neither of us was looking to learn, and one that both of us would rather we hadn't had the opportunity to learn at all. But we have learned it, and having learnt it, we cannot--and should not--forget it. The image is the design of the T-shirts that were handed out to the first 900 people who came to the Martin Luther King, Jr. Commons. I'm happy to report that there weren't any shirts left that I could see, meaning we had at least that many people at the event. Among them, God love them both, were two Virginia Tech students. They gave up the opportunity to be with their compatriots in Blacksburg at their own vigil today so they could come and support us--even as we tried to show our support for them and their fellow Hokies. Their presence is just the latest in a long line of expressions of support that Virginia Tech and its campus community have offered to us in the wake of our own tragedy two months ago--support for which we are eternally and profoundly grateful, and which we can never truly repay. Somehow, though, I don't think my Hokie brethren and sistren will mind. Tonight's vigil was a concrete and physical reminde…
creator: Michael Spires
date: 2008-04-19
contributor: Kacey Beddoes
language: eng

The killer of room 2121
description: It was 7am on Monday. Another week was starting at Virginia Tech. Then the first shots rang out. Within hours, 32 people lay dead and America was left trying to make sense of the carnage. Paul Harris reports from Blacksburg. Sunday April 22, 2007 The Observer A group of Amish men, all in black, shuffled towards the chapel at one end of the enormous sports field that dominates the centre of Virginia Tech's campus. They had come to pay their respects after a tragedy they knew all too well. It was only last year that a killer struck their community, shooting dead five young girls in a tiny Amish school. Now they had driven many long hours from their Pennsylvania farms to southern Virginia, to offer solace to another American community devastated by a mass killing. They spoke in hushed tones to the Reverend Kelly Sisson, one of the pastors of Glade Church in Blacksburg. Then they entered the comforting dark interior to pray and to mourn the dead of Virginia Tech. 'They understand what has happened to us in a way few others do,' Sisson said. Everyone is trying to understand what happened at Blacksburg last week. Impromptu memorials have sprung up on the sports field, covering the grass in flickering candles, pictures of the dead, and flowers. Students, friends and family have written messages, sad, desperate, noble. They speak of loss and love. They vow to remember lives brutally cut short on what should have been just another Monday morning. But, although there was nothing ordinary about last Monday, there was a dreadful familiarity to it. Cho Seung-hui's bloody rampage cost the lives of 32 of his fellow students and staff. It was the worst mass shooting in American history, but far from the only one. There is almost a ritual to such attacks: the fleeing students, the wailing sirens, the mourning survivors, the suicide of the gunman - Cho shot himself in the face. Columbine, the Amish school, Virginia Tech, all are now names that haunt the popular imagination. Yet no on…
creator: Paul Harris
date: 2007-08-13
contributor: Adriana Seagle
rights: In consideration of the fee of GBP 0.00 ("the Fee") Guardian News & Media Limited ("GNM") grants the Licensee the right to: publish on its website for 10 years. Contact info: Eve Thompson; permissions.syndication@guardian.co.uk
language: eng

The Matawan Ribbon Campaign for Virginia Tech
description: When the events of April 16 happened, I was sitting in school, not aware of what was going on. As soon as I got to my eighth period class, which was English 4 with Mr. Lloyd, I sat down and was looking for my pen. A friend of mine walked into class late because he was talking to a teacher. He said, "Something happened at Virginia Tech. 22 people were killed." I looked at him and the entire class looked at me because I am the only one from my high school attending VT in fall 2007. I was upset, but held it together until I got home. Once I got home, I put CNN on and sat down, processing everything that I was seeing on TV and hearing. My world turned into a big blur. I had to do something to make myself feel better. Two hours after I got home, I went to Michaels and bought enough ribbon and pins to make 30 ribbon pins to hand out to anyone who would take them. Two days later, I ran out of ribbons and had to go to Michaels to buy a lot more. I had people asking me for ribbons. Thursday of that week, my school principal authorized me to sell them as a fundraiser, and he bought the first one. I ended up selling or handing out over 100 ribbons and the money totaled $200. I had my school district cut the check and send it down. When I tell people about my fundraiser, it makes me feel good, because I can say that I did my part to help.
creator: Kaitlin Johnsen
date: 2007-06-27
contributor: Kaitlin Johnsen
language: eng

The Moon-After, Virginia Tech Memorial
description: The Moon-After, Virginia Tech Memorial (2007) 40"x30" oil on canvas It is the first time the full moon is observed after the massacre of Virginia Tech. For many, the moon will never look the same again. This is a quest to extract the feelings for the souls that will be missed in the lives of many, and for the souls among us that were touched in different ways. A trans-mix of materialistic and spiritual elements is represented by colorless buildings, lilies to convey an overwhelming feeling of surprise, shock, grieve and hope. Thirty-two different types of lilies in white and orange emerge from the gray-shaded mix of figures, symbolizing the spirits of the 32 victims. With the absence of the victims from sight, they become like images, or like seasonal plants, that are soon gone. Lilies were chosen to represent the diversity of the victims, as lilies grow all over the world in different types. The work on this memorial started with the first full moon after the massacre, and was concluded early June 2007. Original Source: http://www.tonysky.net/tony/pntg12.htm
creator: Antoine Faddoul
date: 2008-04-16
contributor: Antoine Faddoul
language: eng

The Morning After Dedication
description: Shortly after 8 AM on Monday, August 20 - the first day of classes - a group of cadets makes their way across a largely empty drillfield. The intermediate memorial, visible center right, was dedicated the previous day. The large tent used for the dedication ceremony has not yet been taken down. Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0.
creator: Brent Jesiek
date: 2007-08-20
contributor: Brent Jesiek
rights: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0
language: eng

The Motorcade
description: The presidential motorcade arrives at the convocation. Original source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ndicken/464093119/in/set-72157600089911912/ Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommerical-NoDerivs 2.0
creator: Nathan Dicken
date: 2007-05-30
contributor: Chad Newswander
rights: Permission: Nathan Dicken http://www.flickr.com/photos/ndicken/464093119/in/set-72157600089911912/ Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommerical-NoDerivs 2.0
language: eng

The Motorcade
description: The presidential motorcade arrives at the convocation. Original source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ndicken/464093429/in/set-72157600089911912/ Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommerical-NoDerivs 2.0
creator: Nathan Dicken
date: 2007-05-30
contributor: Chad Newswander
rights: Permission Nathan Dicken http://www.flickr.com/photos/ndicken/464093429/in/set-72157600089911912/ Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommerical-NoDerivs 2.0
language: eng

The narrow reach of 'community'
description: By Uwe E. Reinhardt Princetonian Columnist Students gathered in Richardson Auditorium last night for a service in memory of the victims of Monday's shooting at Virginia Tech," reported The Daily Princetonian on April 18. A day earlier, President Tilghman stated that "my reaction was horror at the loss of so many innocent young lives," a sentiment echoed by President Bush when he remarked that "those whose lives were taken did nothing to deserve their fate. They leave behind grieving families and grieving classmates and a grieving nation." Congress openly prayed for the victims and their loves ones. Flags flew at half-mast across the nation. It was good. Solidarity with stricken fellow human beings forges a group of people sharing a geography into a "community" or "nation." As Associate Dean of Religious Life Deborah Blanks put it so eloquently during the memorial: "We dare to affirm that there is strength in community." It takes nothing away from the grief we share with Virginia Tech's community to let the mind wander from that tragedy to another one, the daily toll of fellow human beings grotesquely destroyed or maimed in Iraq, among them many American men and women just as young and innocent as those killed at Virginia Tech. As Keith Olbermann of MSNBC's "Countdown," standing out from the herd politically correct journalists, asked boldly on April 17: "In just the last 10 days, 32 American troops, many the same age as the Virginia Tech students, have died. While one may take issue with the comparison, one cannot ignore the similarities ... It seems fair to ask the question, if the violent deaths in Virginia send the nation into shock and expressions of concern and anxiety, why is not the continuous flow of blood in Iraq creating a similar reaction? Why isn't our flag permanently at half staff?" Olbermann has a point. In just the two days following the shooting at Virginia Tech, close to 400 Iraqis were brutally blown to shreds and hundreds more seriously wounded, …
creator: Uwe E. Reinhardt
date: 2007-06-22
contributor: Sara Hood
rights: Kavita Saini <ksaini@Princeton.EDU>
language: eng

The news gets worse and worse
description: By KEVIN FRISCH Messenger Post Columnist Posted: Apr 23, 01:00 PM EDT What a difference a weekend makes. Last Friday, the big story was brand new man of leisure Don Imus, who was ousted from his nationally syndicated radio program after making a disparaging remark about a women's basketball team. Since the comment was racist in nature, there were calls for a new discussion on the topic of race; a new dialogue on the parallel universes that are black and white America. By Sunday, this conversation was put on hold — along the East Coast, anyway — as attention turned to more immediate concerns. Namely, the weather. A full-fledged 'noreaster made an unwelcome April visit and, for some 36 hours, it snowed slush. Or slushed snow. Or rained snow and slush. Whatever, the result was inches and inches of precipitation leading to flooding, treacherous travel and widespread power outages. By late Monday morning, even those with cold homes and flooded basements were suddenly counting their blessings as they heard the first news reports from Blacksburg, Va. An unspeakably violent week in recent American history had another blood-soaked chapter. In the past 15 years, the week between April 15 and April 22 has seen the siege of the Branch Davidian Compound in Waco, Texas; the Oklahoma City bombing; the Columbine High School shootings and, now, the worst mass shooting in modern U.S. history: the massacre at Virginia Tech. Including the gunman, 33 souls were lost on the college's campus on April 16. Another 26 people were wounded. As the initial shock and confusion gave way to anguish and a search for likely-nonexistent answers, a few reflexive voices were raised. There was right-wing radio host Rush Limbaugh, who climbed onto his high horse to condemn the "drive-by media," whoever they are. (Apparently, Rush has a problem with news people showing up to cover what may well be the biggest story of the year.) There was the almost immediate debate over firearm rights, a customary ec…
creator: Kevin Frisch
date: 2007-07-17
contributor: Brent Jesiek
rights: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5
language: eng

The Now Infamous Va. Tech Video
description: Posted April 17th, 2007 - 15:39PM by Steve Fox Well, it didn't take long. One of my students at the University of Maryland has a brother who attends Virginia Tech and lost two friends yesterday. She started to break down as she told me she would not be in class tonight. As everyone steps up to applaud the "citizen journalism" that occurred yesterday, with kudos upon kudos give to the cellphone video made infamous by CNN, I can't help but think what my student's brother thought yesterday upon seeing that video played over and over and over again. Consider this: the video had no inherent news value and told no story. It did have sounds of bullets being fired and screams. Those were bullets that killed, maimed and injured students and faculty members. This wasn't a video game. Is such video responsible journalism? Are these the types of Citizen Journalists that people want to see? Are we doomed to create "citizen journalists" to play the I-patsies for cable television? There were other not-so-proud moments, including the decision to publish this and then the rush to judgment reported here. As most professional journalists who have covered breaking news and tragedy know, the facts are never clear in the first couple of hours and will likely change. And, when reporting on tragedy, two things rise above most -- try not to do harm and think of those involved -- both victims and their families. It means slowing down. And, thinking, should I really whip out my cellphone here? Cable television long ago threw out the baby with the bath water. Now, breaking news events are an opportunity for ratings as viewers watch tragedy unfold. Journalism? Hardly. Students who were in shock were interviewed regularly, with the final question of "how are you feeling" inevitably searching for a sob. Watching tragedy unfold via cable news is the soap opera of the modern era. It's hardly journalism. Which brings us back to our heralded cell-phone videographer yesterday. The London bombing showe…
creator: Steve Fox
date: 2007-07-16
contributor: Brent Jesiek
rights: Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License
language: eng

The Politics of Pride and Shame
description: April 18, 2007 [Update: I stand by my piece, which is mostly a bunch of questions, rather than statements linking race and culture in the explanative way it is being taken. I merely pointed out that as an American working deeply in the education field for years now, and having identified just such problems (and seen them connected in the Korean-language media for years), that perhaps questions about culture, as related to specific conditions that surround child-rearing, education, being educated overseas, the taboo of discussing mental health in Korean society, etc. might not have played some role here, on top of the fact that many Asian and Asian American males indeed might have specific ways of feeling alienated in "white society." Obviously, to even broach mere questions is deemed "racist" by many readers. Fine. I don't delete comments (unless they are abusive) and people have a right to come in and say what they want - that's why I blog, after all. Yet, before we start flinging around the "R-word" I hope people actually think about what I'm saying, and remember that what I said was that cultural context may be helpful as far as looking at context, but that "Korea" and the rest of the world should look at him as an individual. I spend half my post saying that, and the two need not contradict. And yes, when it comes to the fact that most serial killers have been/are still white men, it does astound me that America seems to have trouble talking about this obvious fact, and mums was the word when Columbine happened. Yet, broaching the topic is going to get one accused of saying their horrendous acts were committed "because they were white," which would again, be not what I said. But pundits of all kinds of backgrounds have license to talk about the concerns of "black youth" as it relates to drugs or violence for years. I don't call doing so "racist" although some strains of it certainly can be. For those who call such explanations as this "back-tracking," well, I gu…
creator: Michael Hurt
date: 2007-06-21
contributor: Brent Jesiek
rights: Michael Hurt (kuraeji@gmail.com)
language: eng

The right to life
description: More gun control doesn't infringe on right to bear arms By: Editorial Board Posted: 4/23/07 It took little time for the journalists and political pundits to start talking gun control. This editorial is not just about last week's Virginia Tech shooting. It's also about the North Mecklenburg High School student who brought a gun on campus last Wednesday, threatened two other students and then left and shot himself. It's about the rumors of a planned shooting that circulated around Orange County High School last Friday and about the student who killed his father, then injured two others at that same school last fall. This editorial isn't about the Second Amendment or taking away Americans' right to bear arms. It's about how to keep guns away from those who are unfit to use them. It's about taking away an easy means of suicide for the roughly 16,000 Americans who killed themselves with a firearm in 2004. It's about limiting the 14,000 murdered by guns in 2005 and the 650 fatal accidents the year before. One reason to study history is to avoid making the same mistakes as in the past. Stricter gun control laws might not prevent tragedy from striking, but they can make it far less likely. Even simple regulations such as background checks can make a huge difference. If somebody has a history of mental illness, that should certainly show up in a background check and prevent that person from buying a gun. And there is no sense in destroying information gathered during those checks after 24 hours, as is mandated by national law, when, in some states, that person can return to buy another gun 30 days later. A comprehensive registration system of gun owners would not hurt anyone but criminals. In Texas, residents do not need a permit to own a gun and do not have to register their firearms. The authorities don't even know how many guns are in the state. In addition, 80 percent of prisoners who own guns received their gun from family or a friend or bought it on the street or illeg…
creator: Editorial Board
publisher: The Daily Tar Heel
date: 2007-07-16
contributor: Sara Hood
rights: Kevin Schwartz <kschwartz@unc.edu>
language: eng