Virginia Tech Shootings: Same Sad Tale, Same Discounted Symptoms, Same Accusatory Fingers
I don't know how many times we are going to have to see this same sad story on the frontpage of the newspapers and as the lead story on the Paleo-media before those charged with the responsibility of caring for our children begin to pay attention to the warning signs.
This time one of the professors at Virginia Tech, Lucinda Roy, became alarmed at the writings of her student, Cho Seung Hui, the unfortunate soul who launched his solitary killing spree Monday that she brought his case to the attention of Virginia Tech officials.
Once more, under the guise of protecting his rights, those who might have prevented this tragedy chose the far easier course of ignoring the problem. Fine, show regard for the students' rights, but let's show concern for all of the students rights.
The Post reports that the class following one of Cho's poetry recitations, only 7 of the 70 students showed up to class, not because they wanted to play "hookie," but because he had frightened them. Sounds like time for action to me.
His poetry was laced with thoughts of death and killing, and once more we find another mass murderer being described as "strange," "odd," "quiet," "friendless," "alienated," you name it, the descriptive words we all regularly hear whenever these sad events occur had been used to describe Mr. Hui. So the question must be asked, where were the people, the questions, and the concern that campuses seem so ready to show when some Conservative group begins to hand out flyers attacking some Liberal icon? Where were the "do-gooders" who seek to promote the anti-business, anti-military, anti-Bush agenda all in the name of "protecting our students?"
I know this may sound a bit cold blooded at a time like this and I am not in any way attempting to diminish the monumental scale of this tragedy, but I feel compelled to point out the inconsistencies that led to this tragedy.
School officials have no problem enforcing their will over the students' rights of free speech when it comes to one of their Sacred Politically Correct Cows. Let a student dare to attempt to hand-out pamphlets decrying affirmative action initiatives, or a students' bill of rights, or attempt to promote a Christian activity, and the administration will fall on them with all the weight a administrative bureaucracy can muster, but here, under the guise of protecting his rights of privacy and free speech, a child possessing all the symptoms routinely observed in a potentially dangerous psycopath was completely ignored inspite of the dire warnings of one of his instructors.
Then, of course, come the finger pointers. The Campus Police "didn't respond properly," or "quickly enough." The local police "failed to respond in a timely manner," or "the warnings weren't given so that students could avoid exposure," or "the students should have been placed in lock-down immediately." Certainly all of these are probably true to one extent or another, but the truth is, the University failed both Mr. Hui, and their student body.
And then of course there is the paramount of Liberal claims, which immediately followed this tragedy, again knowing Liberal mentality, not unexpected, "We need tighter gun control legislation." Once more, those who shirk their own duty immediately blame an inanimate object for the actions and results of an event which should never have been able to occur.
This Post article says one former neighbor described Cho,
The failing here was of an institute, like all institutes of higher learning, that is more concerned with their agenda of political correctness than they are in serving the needs of the students. There is no guarantee that even timely intervention by those in authority could have prevented this tragedy, but there is a very good chance that it would have.
Mr. Hui is such a textbook case for a mass murderer, that I'm certain that even now some college professor is feverishly working on a case study and/or a book to proclaim his wisdom and expertise in understanding tragic young Mr. Cho. The sad part is, if some of those administrators and professors had listened to the seemingly dire warnings of Professor Lucinda Roy, 33 students who are dead might still be alive and attending classes this morning and the heartbroken parents and relatives of these lovely children would be cheering on their accomplishments in school rather than grieving over the loss.
It is time for universities, schools, and all of academia to cease pushing their political agenda and take care of their true responsibility, the care and feeding of young minds.
May God Bless those families and children, including Cho Seung Hui and his family.
This time one of the professors at Virginia Tech, Lucinda Roy, became alarmed at the writings of her student, Cho Seung Hui, the unfortunate soul who launched his solitary killing spree Monday that she brought his case to the attention of Virginia Tech officials.
Once more, under the guise of protecting his rights, those who might have prevented this tragedy chose the far easier course of ignoring the problem. Fine, show regard for the students' rights, but let's show concern for all of the students rights.
The Post reports that the class following one of Cho's poetry recitations, only 7 of the 70 students showed up to class, not because they wanted to play "hookie," but because he had frightened them. Sounds like time for action to me.
Student Wrote About Death and Spoke in Whispers, But No One Imagined What Cho Seung Hui Would DoThis case is not even one which should have surprised anyone had they been paying attention. Cho was "withdrawn" to the point of complete isolation, refusing to respond to instructors, refusing to acknowledge classmates, and basically just being a hole in space.
By Ian Shapira and Michael E. Ruane
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, April 18, 2007; Page A01
BLACKSBURG, Va., April 17 -- They met across the professor's desk. One on one. The chairman of the English department and the silent, brooding student who never took his sunglasses off.
He had so upset other instructors that Virginia Tech officials asked whether the professor wanted protection. Lucinda Roy declined. She thought Cho Seung Hui exuded loneliness, and she volunteered to teach him by herself, to spare her colleagues. The subject of the class was poetry.
Roy, other officials, investigators, acquaintances and neighbors helped fill in a dark portrait Tuesday of the bespectacled young South Korean citizen who had sought bizarre expression in literature and then massacred 32 fellow students and teachers here Monday in the worst shooting rampage in U.S. history. As police closed in, he shot himself and was found on the floor of a classroom building with his weapons nearby.
Cho, of Centreville, the son of immigrants who run a dry cleaning business and the brother of a State Department contractor who graduated from Princeton, was described by those who encountered him over the years as at times angry, menacing, disturbed and so depressed that he seemed near tears.
His poetry was laced with thoughts of death and killing, and once more we find another mass murderer being described as "strange," "odd," "quiet," "friendless," "alienated," you name it, the descriptive words we all regularly hear whenever these sad events occur had been used to describe Mr. Hui. So the question must be asked, where were the people, the questions, and the concern that campuses seem so ready to show when some Conservative group begins to hand out flyers attacking some Liberal icon? Where were the "do-gooders" who seek to promote the anti-business, anti-military, anti-Bush agenda all in the name of "protecting our students?"
I know this may sound a bit cold blooded at a time like this and I am not in any way attempting to diminish the monumental scale of this tragedy, but I feel compelled to point out the inconsistencies that led to this tragedy.
School officials have no problem enforcing their will over the students' rights of free speech when it comes to one of their Sacred Politically Correct Cows. Let a student dare to attempt to hand-out pamphlets decrying affirmative action initiatives, or a students' bill of rights, or attempt to promote a Christian activity, and the administration will fall on them with all the weight a administrative bureaucracy can muster, but here, under the guise of protecting his rights of privacy and free speech, a child possessing all the symptoms routinely observed in a potentially dangerous psycopath was completely ignored inspite of the dire warnings of one of his instructors.
Then, of course, come the finger pointers. The Campus Police "didn't respond properly," or "quickly enough." The local police "failed to respond in a timely manner," or "the warnings weren't given so that students could avoid exposure," or "the students should have been placed in lock-down immediately." Certainly all of these are probably true to one extent or another, but the truth is, the University failed both Mr. Hui, and their student body.
And then of course there is the paramount of Liberal claims, which immediately followed this tragedy, again knowing Liberal mentality, not unexpected, "We need tighter gun control legislation." Once more, those who shirk their own duty immediately blame an inanimate object for the actions and results of an event which should never have been able to occur.
This Post article says one former neighbor described Cho,
"If you walk and you come close to him, he'd walk away," Shash said. "I have kids, and he never talked to them.""Nobody knows him really," Shash said. "He's always quiet. When I talk to him, there's no response."One of his suitemates at Virginia Tech told the Post that:
"In August, when Grewal, Cho and four others moved in, Cho's suitemates tried to talk to him but never got a word in return...'He never looked anyone in the eye. If you even say hi, he'd keep walking straight past you.'"Folks, if you run across someone fitting the above descriptions, let someone know. Don't ignore them, Please! The life you save may be mine.
The failing here was of an institute, like all institutes of higher learning, that is more concerned with their agenda of political correctness than they are in serving the needs of the students. There is no guarantee that even timely intervention by those in authority could have prevented this tragedy, but there is a very good chance that it would have.
Mr. Hui is such a textbook case for a mass murderer, that I'm certain that even now some college professor is feverishly working on a case study and/or a book to proclaim his wisdom and expertise in understanding tragic young Mr. Cho. The sad part is, if some of those administrators and professors had listened to the seemingly dire warnings of Professor Lucinda Roy, 33 students who are dead might still be alive and attending classes this morning and the heartbroken parents and relatives of these lovely children would be cheering on their accomplishments in school rather than grieving over the loss.
It is time for universities, schools, and all of academia to cease pushing their political agenda and take care of their true responsibility, the care and feeding of young minds.
May God Bless those families and children, including Cho Seung Hui and his family.
This is a truly sad occurrence for all of us.
What do you think?
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posted by Will Malven at 5:50 AM
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