A Virgina Tech Twice A Day Everyday
When I got up this morning and switched on CNN (as part of my daily ritual to make sure the market hasn't crashed) I saw the news about Virginia Tech and hid back under the covers.
This sort of barbaric massacre makes me cringe to be a human being.
The numbers are very difficult to assimilate. They say in the news business that one dead person on your block is worth 3,000 dead in a flood in India. It's a gruesome, cynical calculation but undoubtedly one streaked with truth.
It's hard to imagine what a crime scene looks like with 33 bodies and several critically wounded and bleeding. Even more difficult to grasp: the searing pain inflicted on literally hundreds, probably thousands, of relatives and friends of the murdered. Murdered simply because they were in a dorm at the wrong time and faced with a maniac armed with semi-automatic weapons.
And yet... many times this magnitude of pain and death are inflicted every day in Iraq. I'm not talking about combat deaths, not about soldiers. But somewhere around 100 civilians a day were being slaughtered in sectarian killings earlier this year. With the current surge and the resultant "security" plan, that number has fallen to around 60 killings per day.
Two Virginia Techs. Every day. In a country with less than a tenth the population of the U.S. Not only do we not comprehend or assimilate that horror. Some among us actually call it progress.
April 17th, 2007 at 6:42 am
I’m not an American, but like many other foreigners I can’t understand why incidents like this don’t lead to permanent restrictions on the private ownership of guns. After similar massacres in England and Australia legislation has ensured that these things don’t happen again.
Part of the problem of making progress on this score is that the NRA has a strong hold on the American public’s imagination. Proof of this is the success they have peddling the argument that if more people (students even) were allowed to carry guns, it would lead to fewer people getting shot. It’s not hard to demonstrate what’s wrong with this. It seems to based on two premises:
i) If more people carried guns for self-defense, it would reduce the number of causalities in instances like this.
ii) Allowing people to carry guns does not increase the risk of incidents like this occurring.
Premise (i) is at least questionable - especially considering these killers usually take the precaution of wearing bullet proof vests and what not. Indeed, the idea that people need to carry guns to defend themselves against other people with guns implicitly conflicts with premise (ii). In any case, premise (ii) is patently false.
But what I think is interesting is that this argument resonates with the American public because it taps into the “hero” narrative of American TV and movies: the hero saves the day by drawing his gun (it’s almost inevitably a “him”) and blowing away the bad guys. So your average Joe gun-owner thinks to himself - that’s right, if I was there I could’ve stopped the massacre with my trusty hand gun / shot gun/ assault weapon… It’s pure fantasy, but it works every time.
April 17th, 2007 at 6:54 am
What a surprise. No matter what the issue or how tragic an unrelated event, someone on the left finds a way to link it to Iraq. I’m sure that if I said that I like strawberry ice cream, you guys could relate that to Iraq, somehow.
—–
Andrew Montin, what works for you doesn’t necessarily work for us. I kinda like our Bill of Rights. You’ve been doing too much so-called academic studying rather than really understanding the issue and the real cause and effect of gun ownership and deaths.
We have laws against felons owning guns, but they still get them. So, I’ll balance the ineffectiveness of government to prevent crime with my ability to blow an SOB’s head off if he breaks into my house.
April 17th, 2007 at 7:21 am
Nothing is superstructurally unrelated, Wood (you should have an e-mail from me in the next few days re our convo in previous thread)…My response is that this isn’t necc. chickens roosting but….a violent society to the world will always become a violent so iety to itself. Yes, McMoore made this point in Bowling… - but it is self evident. And as someone opposed to gun contro (like liberal hero Jim Webb) I agree that its not the time to talk about gun control or Marilyn Manson or some such. Its time to talk about how empire creates these drones on theh ome front waiting to take their shit out on everyone.
I was in Montreal the day of the massacre at the ecole Polytechnique in 89. I knwo people who escaped…so I’m not minimizing school shootings. I’m saying the problem is American Imperialism - or to be precise, America as a violent society, and the negation of that at home.
April 17th, 2007 at 7:34 am
Rather than saying that America is a violent society, break the society down into sub-cultures and see if that squeezes a better answer. However, nuts aren’t exclusive to us, and this was the act of a nut, and, at least, we don’t have a culture encouraging suicide bombers. America and our system aren’t to blame for everything. We have yet to learn much about the killer and any possible motives (girl friend, grades, nut case, etc.) Let’s get the facts before we start making conclusions.
April 17th, 2007 at 7:35 am
P.S. Thanks for forwarding that information to me. I’ll get back with you on it.
April 17th, 2007 at 7:37 am
“Let’s get the facts before we start making conclusions.”
I’m sure that Woody, and his fellow peckerwoods, would be saying the exact same thing had the killer turned out to be a Middle Easterner.
April 17th, 2007 at 8:09 am
The NRA has done a good job of lumping all guns together: handguns, hunting rifles, and military style automatic and semi-automatic that can fire quickly or continuously.
Most of our crimes are done with handguns, and these school shooting guys often get ahold of automatic weapons, or semi-automatics that can easily be converted–the kits are sold online.
April 17th, 2007 at 9:06 am
Superstructure = all that stuff Marxists can’t explain
April 17th, 2007 at 9:22 am
It appears that the shooter was a Korean Graduate student. Funny that he did it here and not in Seoul. Guess he wasn’t angry there.
I’m not going to get into the tired argument over the meaning of the second amendment but, as I point out elsewhere, if you treat it as an absolute individual right, like the first, then certain consequences flow from that.
Having freedom of speech and assembly means you have to let Nazis march in Skokie and Ann Coulter call people “fags”.
Having the “Right to Bear Arms” means you Get Columbine and, now, VPI
Your choice.
April 17th, 2007 at 9:28 am
Oh wait, this just in. That Korean student had a Snoop Dog CD on him and his dorm room had lots of rap from NWA. That’s who to blame!
April 17th, 2007 at 10:02 am
This is a superb article…and so needed in a nation that finds it difficult to realize that bloodshed and death are painful to others than Americans.
Our youngsters are growing up with themessage that it is perfectly legitimate to kill people who have never harmed you in any way. The gunman at VT went berserk. No sane persondoes what he did, unless, of course, he is the President of the US.
In our name, Bush’s Shock and Awe attack on Iraq killed tens of thousands of innocents who never, ever harmed us in any way. Most of America did not mourn their deaths.
Those of us who marched and protested and pleaded for the lives of Iraqi civilians are just as saddened by these terrible deaths, But we also cannot help believing that the murder of others in the guise of an unjust and illegal war based on lies is equally as horrific.
HERE we have written against the murderous acts of this administration for nearly five years. We mourn them all.
April 17th, 2007 at 10:06 am
It’s pretty sick that so many are turning this unrelated domestic tragedy into an attack on our President and the war in Iraq. Wait, this is like the liberal 9-11 widows, who used the tragedy of their husbands’ deaths to make political statements. You folks have no shame or decency.
April 17th, 2007 at 10:19 am
Come on, you leftwing pansies, if those teachers and students had had concealed weapons like our 230-year-old Constitution guarantees us, they’d a blown that Korean rat’s ass off the planet before he had a chance to whack who he whacked.
As long as leftwingers allow these Korean Commies–aren’t they commies? Oh, he’s from South Korea? Our buddies? OK. Hey, I’m changing my mind; I’m defending this guy. I mean, it was legal for him to carry concealed weapons in Virginny, wasn’t it?–Virginny is a hillbilly state and to a hillbilly the two most precious things in his life are his rifle and his hound. So, hell, this Korean student was simply showing he’s a fine, upstanding, NRA cardcarrying American killer, the kind we like in this country. This country is no place for leftwing cowards and bleeding-heart liberal wussies–pansies all. It takes a real man to blow away 32 people in one day. Hell, that’s why it takes a real man’s army to blow those hundreds of towelheads away at a greater rate in Iraq (you see, war is exciting and quite an adventure for a real MAN, a place to put into practice his God-given right to kill his fellowman with impunity). Don’t forget those Afghani dead, too; they deserved it otherwise our President wouldn’t have taken us there. We must wake up and admit President Bush is probably our greatest military leader ever. We just haven’t woken up to that fact yet.
Did you hear our president defending our right to bear arms while showing his kindness and consideration for the people killed there in those hills of Virginny? What a man. Now’s there’s the kind of leadership we need against these foreign-terrorist-agitators (we called ‘em outside agitators in the evil Civil Rights Movement and the anti-American anti-VietNam war movement). Do you think our president carries a concealed weapon? I hope he does, praise the Lord.
Kill or be killed, pals; that’s the Amurican way!
Arm now or pay later.
Ur fiend
thegrowlingwolf
April 17th, 2007 at 10:21 am
Mr. Montin, many years ago I had an occasion to drive my mother, who was in her late 70s, across Wyoming to visit my brother in Utah. My mother was born and raised in New York which has some of our country’s strictest gun control laws. My mother would have, under no circumstances, owned a gun or figure she had any reason to fire one. On a particularly desolate stretch of road in western Wyoming she mused that it made perfect sense to her why Alan Simpson’s mother might have owned a shotgun. Reportedly, Alan Simpson’s mother was a pretty good shot.
Personally, I take no well defined stand on gun control. I admit to owning several types of guns, enjoy skeet shooting, target shooting at the range, and do my own reloading. I do keep a loaded double action .38 in my nightstand; the top chamber is empty. My fantasy life would have included an opportunity to compete in a winter biathlon. I am very well educated, and to look at me, no one would think that I’d have an interest. People are often very surprised when they discover I do. I know folks for whom owning a gun is a tool of their western ranching trade. As I do, those same folks might be quite willing to argue that the average citizen has no need of a semi-automatic, automatic, or military assault style gun. However, those weren’t the type of guns used at Virginia Tech.
In instances such as this one, I am often drawn back to thinking about a book one of my ‘leftist’ professors assigned in a graduate class; Has Freedom a Future by Adolph Lowe. At the time, I found it a profoundly depressing read. I think I’m going to have to dig it out and read it again.
April 17th, 2007 at 10:38 am
I was on a train in Europe 20 years ago, and some guy shot some woman on the train. Another passenger opened fire on the shooter but missed and hit an elderly lady. Just then the train guard rush in and fired at the the dude who hit the elderly lady, killing him. Arming more people just guarantees a larger mess.
April 17th, 2007 at 10:50 am
Having freedom of speech and assembly means you have to let Nazis march in Skokie and Ann Coulter call people “fags”.
Having the “Right to Bear Arms” means you Get Columbine and, now, VPI
Your choice.
JC: My aren’t we tendentious. You may be right- I’m not sure - on gun control. But your attitude towards free speech (the Nazis had every right to march - and people have the right to shout at tehm) - is chilling.
April 17th, 2007 at 10:53 am
Superstructure- roughly the material root of things. To translate what I said, no social phenomenon can be divorced from any other social phenomenon, and the primary social phenomenen is antagonism, what Hegel calls the master/slave dialectic.
April 17th, 2007 at 10:57 am
thegrowlingwolf does a good interpretation of what he thinks of conservatives but not of what conservatives think.
April 17th, 2007 at 10:57 am
Irony alert jc. What I’m saying is that being an absolutist on the First Amendment may get you insulted or outrage. Absolutism on the second can get you killed.
I’ll leave it to you to figure out which I can live with and which I cannot.
HINT: You won’t find the answer in Gramsci.
April 17th, 2007 at 12:48 pm
Its hard to read “tone.” I reccomend Daniel Lazare and others’ work on how the constitution itself is outdated.
I’m not a huge Gramsci fan, or that of 20th century “postmarxism” which derive from him, though I do like his prison writings.
April 17th, 2007 at 1:25 pm
Thanks Jc: I studied Marxism in college, and didn’t buy it then, either.
April 17th, 2007 at 1:31 pm
There are exceptions to the rule - Perry Anderson, Zizek, Terry Eagleton, etc. But most “post marxists” and postmodernists, french rhetoriticians, etc. - there’s no “there” there. Esp. those who think class is somehow outmoded, making them to the right of Jim Webb, even. Their theories - and I know these people - are so self-serving, because they often dictate that instead of “class” the dominant point of view should be that of intellectuals. Talk about elitism.
April 17th, 2007 at 1:46 pm
“this is like the liberal 9-11 widows, who used the tragedy of their husbands’ deaths to make political statements”
Darn liberals! Why can’t they see that exploiting the dead meat of slaughtered American bodies left in the rubble of the World Trade Center is the exclusive domain of the Republican Party, and the rest of the right wing? How dare these widows demand some accountability from the administration!
April 17th, 2007 at 1:49 pm
It’s too bad, Woody, that “liberals” (which has come to mean pretty much anyone with an independent thought) can’t see that you and Ann Coulter are the only ones who should be able to exploit 9-11, so you can add to your Grateful Dead knick knack collections. Wanker.
April 17th, 2007 at 3:42 pm
Liberals? Independent Thought? Those terms don’t even go together. They’re like sheep following the herd and manipulated by politicians willing to buy their votes with handouts. The voices coming from liberals come out only after checking the latest talking points and activist orders from the mass emails. On this topic, every site with liberals participating compares Virginia Tech’s murders to Iraq. There’s no independent thought at all. If you want to understand the individual, you have to understand conservatives.
April 17th, 2007 at 5:00 pm
Woody is on one sick roll this week, eh? Woodster, I was capable of more critical thinking than you at the age of six then you’ll have on the best day of your life. The 9-11 widows called out your hero, who, alas for you, will not escape the somewhat more demanding eye of history, at least more demanding then the Media who rolled over for his sorry ass circa 2001-2005. Better get used to it, sicko.
Cummings, the facts are far from in, but the easy access of the rapid repeating gun is sure looks a big part of the story here. In addition, the issue of this kid’s medication should be explored, as it wasn’t in the case of Columbine.
I’ve come to get pretty fatalistic about these events. They are pretty much ritualistic human sacrifices the NRA seems to require making to the Gun Gods.
April 17th, 2007 at 5:06 pm
With apologies, Woody…
Conservatives? Independent Thought? Those terms don’t even go together. They’re like sheep following the herd and manipulated by politicians willing to solicit their votes with promises that carry no implicit or explicit costs. On the topic of 9-11, every site with Conservatives participating links the terrorist attacks to Iraq.
I come close to agreeing with, “If you want to understand the individual, you have to understand conservatives.”, but I would amend that statement to read, If you want to understand the individual, you should consider classical liberal thought. Still, I would add that individuals have both self-centered and other-centerd concerns. Although (unselfish) individual altruism is not adequately explained by economic, theologic, or conservative thinkers, it does not follow that (unselfish) individual altruism does not exist. [Where, unselfish=no expected return; the absolute absence of quid pro quo.]
April 17th, 2007 at 5:19 pm
I’ve been busting my ass all day far away from the web and although I haven’t read all of the remarks, the “Reg” at 10;02 was a different “reg”. I have nothing to say about this other than it was obviously awful.
April 17th, 2007 at 7:12 pm
The Department of Defense has identified 3,293 American service members who have died since the start of the Iraq war. It confirmed the deaths of the following Americans yesterday:
BISHOP, Ryan A., 32, Specialist, Army; Euless, Tex.; 10th Mountain Division.
BORBONUS, John G., 19, Pfc., Army; Boise, Idaho; 25th Infantry Division.
BOWMAN, Larry R., 29, Sgt., Army; Granite Falls, N.C.; 513th Transportation Company, 57th Transportation Battalion, 593rd Corps Support Group.
PUTNAM, Cody A., 22, Cpl., Army; Lafayette, Ind.; 25th Infantry Division.
SANTEE, Daniel J., 21, Lance Cpl., Marines; Mission Viejo, Calif.; Second Marine Logistics Group, Second Marine Expeditionary Force.
April 18th, 2007 at 12:26 am
I actually just saw something very profound on Larry King… seriously. They had the Dean of the English Dept., who had raised concerns about the maniac’s writings to campus security, police, her peers, everyone. No one took the violence, deep anger and lack of empathy in his writings seriously, because it didn’t have explicit or actionable evidence. Typical post 9/11 viewpoint. They will call USC kids parents because they are having a “sit-in” over sweatshop labor, but not an apparently dangerously harmed soul (this Dean seemed to be the only person who tried to help this guy). I want to read this kid’s note. I hear he talks about “spoiled rich kids” and debauchery.
On gun control, the US will never go house to house collecting the 350 million guns or whatever. We can make certain kinds illegal, but a personal handgun is never going away unless white kids start dropping in the numbers darks skinned kids do…
April 18th, 2007 at 7:59 am
I don’t disagree with your characterization of traditional “liberals.” But that term has become so extrapolated by the right that it now encompasses anyone opposed to George W. Bush’s policies - ANY of his policies. The Catholic Church opposes the Iraq War and the treatment of prisoners? Oop, they are “liberal.” I’ve even heard William F. Buckley being called a liberal for criticizing Bush war policy.
Same thing with me: In many ways, I am more of a traditional conservative (anti-abortion, pro-second amendment, free speech advocate, pro-freedom, critic of communism and socialism) than you. But it doesn’t seem to innoculate me from being called - by you - a “liberal.” In fact, I don’t even merit a “moderate liberal” label!
So all this talk about “liberal, liberal, liberal”…just buzzwords that mean nothing. I can call you a fascist, but beyond namecalling it means little.
April 18th, 2007 at 9:56 am
Mental Health is an important component here but how is it that a person with this background - referral to mental health clinics and a placement on Suicide Watch - was able to legally purchase firearms in Virginia in the first place? Can you say “Background Check”?
April 18th, 2007 at 10:18 am
Its funny…as I said I’m not convinced on gun control as an issue alone - I think thigns are far more multidetermined and things like this are a symptom, not a cause. That said, when I first travelled through the South in America, I was shocked - weired out even - at the extent of gun availabilitty, sometimes even at truckstops at the side of highways.
Make no mistake, I think that there are situations when people have to be armed. I know people in rural areas who would have to wait an hour for police to arrive in case of robbery/intrusion, etc. They have a perfectly understanadbale reason to own guns. But treating them like another commodity while throwing Tommy Chong in jail for distributing waterpipes reflects very skewed priorities.
i do think, when all is said and done, someone with this guys’ profile woudl have found an illict weapon if he wasn’t able to buy one though.
April 18th, 2007 at 10:33 am
Have to disagree with this very first comment:
“But what I think is interesting is that this argument resonates with the American public because it taps into the “hero” narrative of American TV and movies: the hero saves the day by drawing his gun (it’s almost inevitably a “him”) and blowing away the bad guys.”
Always a him? The most recent movie I’ve seen, “Grindhouse”, has a chick with a machine gun for a leg as well as a female stunt driver who takes a shot at Kurt Russell’s shoulder. TV shows like CSI and Law and Order routinely have female cops drawing arms. The armed, kick ass super-female is as American as apple pie.
You might be able to get away with “mostly” but not “inevitably”.
April 18th, 2007 at 10:54 am
[…] an unnecessary war - yes, it’s harsh, but it’s true, and as one blogger pointed out, Iraq suffers two Virginia Techs a day on […]
April 18th, 2007 at 11:06 am
rlc - I don’t understand why you try to politicize this tragedy with the attempts to deny 2nd amendment rights to crazy people. Clearly the lessons to be learned here are two - as Debbie Schussel observed, maybe we shouldn’t let so many foreign students into the country (okay, he came here when he was 8, but third graders clearly qualify as Students), and as Derbyshire and several others have noted, these VaTech students are real wusses if they can’t take down a guy who’s only got a couple of handguns but merely hide under desks, try to barricade doors and jump out of windows (okay, one professor was killed confronting the gunman to protect his students - but in general these students were pretty much left defenseless, literally and figuratively, by the liberal nexus of the proliferation of feminist studies, postmodernism and sanctions against concealed weapons.)
April 18th, 2007 at 1:10 pm
Of course, I could be wrong…
Here’s Lt.Col. Bob Batemen, snipped from his comments at “Altercation”:
I am sick of idiots with an agenda pretending that what happened at Virginia Tech is not because we have too many damned guns in this country. Muzzle-loading blackpowder rifles, single-shot breech-loading hunting rifles, and single-barrel breech-loading shotguns, and that is about it, are all that should be allowed. Those tools can be used, legitimately, to hunt. You want more, move. Leave the United States to those who know the difference between something that is useful for hunting, and something that replaces the manhood you never attained. If you want more, join the Army. If you can’t do that, and if you still want something that reloads quickly and gives you plenty of shots, BUY A DAMNED BOW!
But what really puts me over the top is one particular brand of NRA stupidity. That is the myth of the Wild West. In other words, if I hear one more stupid gun-loving sonuvabitch talk about how, “Well, if they just had allowed all those students to have guns, this lunatic at Virginia Tech wouldn’ta got far,” I am going to slap his dumb ass on the first plane smokin’ for Iraq, where I would like to personally drop him off, with as many guns as he would like, in Dora (that’s a particularly nasty South Baghdad neighborhood with which I am familiar).
Yes, Dora would be perfect. In my mind’s eye I am imagining plopping said gun nut off outside the blue-painted major police sub-station, just about six or seven blocks from another walled-in compound which is now a police barracks (or, at least it was, last year.). As a microcosm, Dora should be the NRA’s dream town, as it perfectly matches the NRA “Wild West” theory of what is needed in a society: honor is important to the individual; the family is the most important part of society; all of the inhabitants are very religious (except for when they are not); and absolutely everyone has at least one gun.
In fact, I would very much like to personally place the CEO of the NRA, Mr. Wayne LaPierre, there right now. What’ya say, Wayne? Want to experience a world where everyone has a gun? C’mon, buddy, I’ll even let you hump the pig.
(That means, “Carry the M-240 7.62 mm machine gun,” people. Get your minds out of the gutter.)
OK, I’m calmer now.
April 18th, 2007 at 1:34 pm
Fired one of those once - but you really get a rush from the M-79 grenade launcher. BAM!
I now return you to the real world!
(Proud of the fact that I last fired a weapon in Nov 1971 while requalifying at Ft. Meade)
April 18th, 2007 at 8:16 pm
Maybe a cultural studies professor could have written the shooter out of his discourse. The narrative could ahve been reframed from its essentialist core and sutured interrogatorively without ignoring the shooter’s concrete immanence. An eschatology thus based on a lack of a shooter (Virginia Tech massacre did not exist, it was but a spectacle) will gradually lift the veil off a more inspiring hegemony.
April 19th, 2007 at 4:27 pm
[…] Marc Cooper […]
April 19th, 2007 at 6:52 pm
Virginia Tech’s Los Angeles Alumni Association Holds Candlelight Vigil
WHO: Virginia Tech Alumni Association, Los Angeles Chapter 52
WHAT: Candlelight Vigil
WHEN: Friday, April 20, 7pm
WHERE: Santa Monica Beach, CA, North side of the main pier on the beach
WHY: In memory of the 32 students who lost their lives on April 16.
For additional information please contact
Terry Gravely at vtgravely@hotmail.com or Kate McNally at
katemcnally@aol.com
April 20th, 2007 at 9:43 am
Wow! What a diverse readership you have, Marc! Could it be that right wing and NRA groups are assirnged radical blogs to read to and attack?
Here’s what I wonder about. It does seem that your response, which was also mine, was to mourn the students in Virginia and then wonder about making bumper stickers that say Blacksburg Happnes 2X a day in Baghdad.
What it seems the offended americafirstandonlies don/t understand is that those women and children dying in Baghdad are real, that their parents and children and husbands and wives suffer exactly as wel do. Somehow, dead children don’t count unless they are within our national boundaries…and maybe don’t even count if they die in drive-by shootings in LA or the Bronx.
April 20th, 2007 at 11:36 am
The debate over whether NBC was right to broadcast the CHO Manifesto and its addenda is like the debate over torture. We should not be having the debates.
It should be common knowledge that torture is heinous, barbaric, uncivilized and outdated in civilized countries. So it should not be debated.
For the media “ethicists”: It should be common knowledge that when a perpetrator of a mass murder incorporates into his crime a justifying manifesto, its publication is acting as accessory and collaborator to the crime. So it should not be debated.
The fact that the two subjects are in fact debated shows how debased this country has become.
April 20th, 2007 at 6:51 pm
Thank you Kate for one of the very few appropriate comments here in consideration of 32 grieving families, including Cho’s.
I hope some good will come from this tragedy, and it can if we can understand how a clearly mentally/emotionally disturbed student, raising red flags of all kinds long before, was allowed to remain without other students knowledge, and fix it by law.
April 23rd, 2007 at 2:28 pm
In the spirit of Mr. Cooper’s post we have this (which is nearly 3/4 of all you need to know about contemporary liberalism).
Gross exploitation of poor brown people in the developing world is like really bitchen but dumb, mean comments about a few middle class black girls is more or less the worst thing ever.