I feel compelled to express my deep sadness over the horrible tragedy on the campus of Virginia Tech yesterday. My heart goes out to the families of all those who were killed or injured, as well as the thousands of parents whose hearts stopped when they first heard of the shootings, knowing their own precious son or daughter was in harm's way.
There have been lots of senseless killings on campuses in my lifetime - Kent State and Columbine being the first two to come to mind - but I really didn't want to live to see the day when we heard about the worst campus killing spree in the history of the world.
Time was, when young adults went through life with a feeling of invincibility, as if death only happened to "old people". That could be a good thing, as they were willing to take chances and experiment, or a bad thing, as they were foolhardy to take chances and experiment. We may never know why this tragedy happened, but I suspect it has changed the climate of campuses everywhere .... forever.
6 comments:
Everything you said so well is true and how I feel too. I have been so caught up in this senseless tragedy, watching way too much about it on television. It's a strange thing to say, but it takes an event to pull us together and I think the whole nation feels the same on this one. My younger son is really unsettled by this. He didn't want to go to school today but I told him it would be good to talk with his fellow students about it. Too, too sad.
I was teaching 4th and 5th graders when the Columbine massacre happened, so I can understand why a child would not want to go to school after this kind of news. Talking about it is good, though, and helps them to cope.
We watched the service at VT today, but I'm limiting my TV exposure to it.
What is perhaps sadder than one evil insane person is that now we can expect copycat attempts to elevate themselves into a kind of prominence that they might want.
This was such a terrible tragedy Rosemary. It was all over the news in England too. I think the main problem is that guns are just too readily available now and there are so many crazy people out there. It must be an awful shock to a lot of young people when they see something like this happen to their peers. You can understand kids not wanting to go to school or college after something like this.
Sad, but true, Jan. This makes the third mass murder in US history for this same week - Oklahoma City, Columbine, and now VT.
As horrific as this was, I'm not surprised it make big headlines in England, Naomi. It's not just that guns are so easy to get, it's that someone who obviously did not qualify by today's laws was able to go buy one legally. My own opinion is that the mental institution that let him go is going to end up being the "bad guy" in all this, plus the school administration that allowed him to be enrolled with that kind of a diagnosis.
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