I know I will take a whole bunch of crap for this, but I’m going to say it anyway.
First off, what happened in Blacksburg, Virginia on Monday was an unnecessary, senseless tragedy and my heart goes out to all of the victims' families, students, classmates, teachers and the overall general community that Virginia Tech encompasses.
The next thing is that I lived in Charlottesville, Virginia for 4.5 years. Charlottesville is where the University of Virginia (UVA) is located and they are the in-state rival to Virginia Tech (VT). That being said, I have no allegiance to either school, but I know of the rivalry and I’ve been to both campuses numerous times. I know a number of people who have graduated from each school and both schools are well respected amongst each community.
All of that aside, the VT students have laid a lot of blame at the feet of the administration for not locking down the campus after the first gunshot incident at the dorm. In my opinion, for the most part, the school acted accordingly. I say for the most because I think the email that arrived at 9:26 was far too after-the-fact, but I do not believe it would have saved any less than the 32 lives lost and the countless numbers that were wounded. Of course, hindsight is 20/20 and this is just my opinion.
Now this part is going to get me in trouble with people. While the students are bitching at the administration (and probably the parents too), we are reading stories on the internet about how the students believed he could be a school shooter (before this event occured), that his creative writing stories were unbelievably violent and that he showed signs of being mentally disturbed. The fact that he was also sent to counseling for his stalker-like actions and he was removed from a class by a professor who claims she knew he was the shooter before his name even came out bothers me more than anything. I have to lay blame on ALL of these people for not doing something sooner. Did we not learn anything from Columbine? Apparently, the stories from the creative writing class, which I’ll also address in a minute, were talked about at great length by the other students in the class, but no one did anything about it, other than the former chairwoman of the English department. Students said that they were supposed to recap their creative stories after having them discussed with the rest of the class, but the teacher did not even ask him to do so because he never spoke to anyone. What kind of insanity is that from a college professor? I find it amazing he made it to his senior year of college without any interaction in his classes. Particularly being an English major, you would think he would have to do some speaking and defend his writing at some point during his college career. Sadly, no. He was just passed onto the next phase of the system, only to finally come to the breaking point on Monday morning, April 16, 2007. At least the one professor had some sense to ask him to be removed from the class (because he was photographing some of the other students and it bothered them) and have him admitted to counseling.
As for his creative writing, if you have not read the stories online, I urge you to read them. A) In my opinion, they are not nearly as graphic as some people would like you to believe; and B) I find it incomprehensible that a college senior wrote them. These are stories that a 12 or 13 year old might write. The grammar is horrendous and while the topics were gross, they are issues a child or early teen would usually deal with, not a 23-year old.
Honestly, I do have a heart. It disturbed me all day on Monday that this would happen in such a nice place, to such great people, but I feel that the blame does not lie solely with the shooter. I think everyone who ever encountered him, in whatever limited capacity it may have been, have a drop of blood on their hands as well and that is what saddens me most. We had the chance to stop this, but ignored the problem, hoping it would graduate and go away instead.
With each of the links I've provided to main stories, there are several links which will explain more of the issues I've discussed here, most of them are cnn.com videos.
