Virginia Tech: It's Not About Gun Control, and You're a Fool or a Monster If You Say It Is
Apr. 18th, 2007 at 12:02 AM Virginia is, if memory serves, one of the states that had a particularly malevolently horrible 2004 national election, one marked by substantial Republican chicanery and vicious suppression of the minority vote, so the last thing on earth that I could ever have imagined myself doing was cheering for Virginia's Republican governor, Tim Kaine. But Tuesday afternoon I not only cheered out loud over something he said, I was so glad he said it that I was waving my fist over my head and very nearly jumped out of my chair. And it wasn't just what he said, but how he said it; I wish I could find a way to show it to you. But at the end of the Tuesday press conference, some sleazebag in the audience, knowing how pro-gun Kaine is, tossed him what he probably thought was a softball question, namely, did the governor think that some of the deaths could have been averted if Virginia Polytechnic students had been allowed to carry concealed firearms on campus? Instead of the reaction the so-called "reporter" was expecting, what happened was that governor Kaine's face twisted up as if he had bitten into a bug. And with disgust dripping from his voice, he said something to the effect that the only response he had to anybody who would try to use this tragedy to make any kind of a point about gun control was "total loathing." And he's right. So I don't feel good that I've let some of you prod me into having to defend my statement from last night that neither more guns on campus, nor fewer guns, would have made things any better. That some of y'all are sliming up this horrible but essentially random tragedy, that some of you are dragging your muddy political bootprints all over this while the corpses aren't even yet in the ground, that so many of you are so sick as to seek to twist this massacre into proof that your side should win in the literally pointless debate over gun control before even one family can bury their dead in peace, both sickens me and lowers my opinion of some of you. It lowers my opinion of your collective intelligence, too, because both arguments are so trivially disposed of that I'm having to struggle to maintain my faith in your sincerity -- or even your basic decency, your humanity. If you're one of the people who's been doing so, whether pro-gun or anti-gun, you should be ashamed of yourself. Fewer Guns Wouldn't Have Prevented the Massacre. I'd like to thank xiphias for being the first to point out to me, in the replies to somebody else's journal posting, that while the Virginia Tech massacre is the worst school shooting in American history, it is only the second worst school massacre. The worst school massacre in American history was in Bath Township, Michigan, and its murderer used no guns at all, but instead a pair of bombs. It was in 1927, before the Depression even really began, when a farmer about to lose his farm because of rising property taxes decided to vent his wrath on the community by destroying the public building they were taking his farm to pay off, the local school. With the students still in it. He then waited at the scene, and made history as the first ever suicide car bomber, blowing up the first wave of would-be rescuers who rushed to the scene. This is probably also a good time to remind you that it is, perhaps, a good thing that Eric Harris and Dylan Kleibold had guns. They had not planned to shoot up Columbine High School. They had planned to level it, and to that end had planted two ill-designed propane bombs. Their original plan was to use the guns only to pick off any survivors of the blast that escaped the rubble, before killing each other. Had they not had guns, they might have come back another day with better bombs instead of wandering around shooting at random, and the death toll would probably have been substantially higher. I know that Seung Cho didn't do anything at Virginia Tech on Monday that he couldn't have done just as easily and even more effectively with a machete or a good kitchen knife and a couple of ordinary pipe bombs. England's got pretty strict gun control, you know. During the Troubles, this caused neither the Irish Republican Army nor the Ulster militias any difficulty whatsoever whenever they got the urge to slaughter a large number of people in British-occupied Ireland, either. Oh, once in a rare while they used guns smuggled to them (depending on which side they were on) either from the British army or from sympathizers here in the US. But more often, they used explosives. It's also worth pointing out that, since we destroyed their government, Iraqis have had a Virginia-Tech-sized school massacre at least once a month for the last four years. Even though the Iraqi people are some of the most heavily armed in the world, even more heavily armed than your average American, none of their school massacres have involved guns, either. When al Qaeda wants to slaughter high school or college students, they use suicide bombers, just like at Bath Township, just like the Columbine killers tried to do. For that matter, when Timothy McVeigh decided to slaughter a ton of federal employees in Oklahoma City in revenge for the Waco massacre, he didn't need any guns to do it, either, remember? Just some ammonium nitrate fertilizer, a couple of barrels of diesel fuel, and a few blasting caps. Throughout history, we've been lucky when the sickos take up guns rather than bombs; the bombers were the ones that produced the truly horrific death tolls. So you should count yourself lucky that Seung Cho had decided to buy two handguns when he was indulging his violent fantasies to himself over the last month or so, one of them a weeny little .22 that he probably didn't manage to kill anybody with, rather than the dynamite or pipe bombs or other improvised explosive devices he might have bought or built if he hadn't had guns. More Guns Wouldn't Have Prevented the Massacre, Either. I grant that this case is a little harder to make, but the only reason that this isn't obvious is that too many of you have failed to think through what would have happened if some armed student had tried to use his own handgun to overpower Seung Cho. So let's roll back the clock to Monday morning, or roll it forward to the next school shooting, and pit Rampaging Killer against some hypothetical John Q. Student, both of them armed with handguns. It's 9:45 on a Monday morning, and it has slowly dawned on John that that banging noise down the hall isn't construction, but some guy with a gun and a ton of ammunition working his way from classroom to classroom. Or maybe John gets a text message on his phone from someone who tells him that there's a pistol-wielding maniac in a bullet-proof vest full of ammo heading his way. John, being a responsible type, draws his weapon, pulls the firing pin out of his wallet and resets it, removes the safety, chambers a round, and somehow miraculously gets this all done in time to draw a careful bead on the door, waiting for Rampaging Killer to enter. We will even give him the unlikely credit for having thought to look for the flak jacket and the gun, so he doesn't accidentally shoot any of his fellow students who are fleeing from the shooter into this room. So the door bangs open, and John Q. Student sees a flak jacket and a gun, and then one of only three possible things happens: 1. Remember that John Q. Student has not just spent the whole morning practicing shooting at real human beings. On the contrary, shooting at an actual human being is something that he's never done before. In fact, the odds against his having ever fired a pistol at any moving target are astronomical. Also, we know that John Q. Student has at least some humanitarian impulse, at least some urge to not shoot at people. I say this because, frankly, if he's been carrying this gun with him everywhere he goes for long enough that he happened to have it on him when he needed it, if he didn't have that hesitation to shoot another person, he would have shot somebody by now and would be in jail, not in a classroom waiting for Rampaging Killer. So I flatly guarantee you that he shoots late, and that he jerks the weapon when he shoots as his body reflexively tries to stop him from shooting someone, and the round goes completely wild. How can I guarantee this? Because this situation has come up over and over again since the invention of the gun, and it is what everybody except for a few combat veterans has done, the first time that they've fired a gun at a criminal. And that's if he fires the gun at all. In example after example, we have seen that what John Q. Student is much more likely to do is the stupidest thing he could possibly do: shout "drop the weapon" or yell "stop or I'll shoot" or fire a warning shot, wanting to give Rampaging Killer a chance to surrender. All that this achieves is to tell Rampaging Killer, now a practiced shooter, exactly where to aim. If Rampaging Killer hadn't made up his mind whether or not to shoot up this particular room, he does now, starting with emptying his clip at John and thereby gunning down everybody between John and the wall behind him, and everybody for three feet on either side. 2. Or else, when John Q. Student sees a flak jacket and a gun come through that door, he's thought of this possibility. Or maybe he's a combat veteran himself. So knowing better than to try to get Rampaging Killer to not shoot, he immediately opens fire the instant he has a target, and let's give him the benefit of the doubt and assume that he shoots improbably accurately. Only guess what? More doors were banged open by the SWAT team, who covered more of the building looking for Rampaging Killer, than were banged open by Rampaging Killer. So the odds are that John Q. Student shoots Officer Friendly, and now we have at least one more corpse. And at least one more killer. 3. Or else maybe this particular John Q. Student is a combat veteran, and an Olympic quality pistol shot, and has faster reflexes than your average Olympic athlete and thinks faster and more clearly than any college aged student you've ever met in your life or that you ever will. So in the 1/10th of a second between when the flak jacket and gun crash through that door and when he would need to pull the trigger, he recognizes Officer Friendly's police uniform, and therefore holds his fire. Officer Friendly makes his combat entry into the room, sweeping his weapon across it in a practiced move, knowing that if Rampaging Killer is in the room and waiting for him then he absolutely must get a shot into Rampaging Killer fast or he's going to die. Officer Friendly sees John Q. Student's gun barrel, mistakes John Q. Student for Rampaging Killer, and empties an assault rifle into the area where John Q. Student is sitting, killing John, everybody within 3 feet either side of him, and everybody behind him for at least two rooms. Alas, Rampaging Killer was two floors away. Now we have an entire roomful of more victims. No other outcome is even vaguely humanly possible. Frankly, if he had any impulse to fight the Rampaging Killer rather than to jump out a window or bar the door, John Q. Student would have been safer and just as effective if he had used his bare hands. And to again draw the parallel to Iraq, I've read that virtually every adult male Iraqi owns an assault rifle, and has since long before Saddam was overthrown. If "more guns" are the solution to school violence, then why are the Iraqis having at least one Virginia-Tech-sized school massacre every month? So What Are the Politicians Supposed to Do? Voters in a democracy are prone to an obnoxious fault: when something truly awful happens, they demand that every elected official do something about it, right now. It doesn't matter whether or not there is anything that elected official can do that would be at all useful. All that matters is that the voters see every politician prove that he or she cares about the same things the voters care about by doing something, however futile or counter-productive. So in a way, while it's sick and tragic and pointless and futile and stupid and inhumane to the families of the victims that we're having a gun control argument now, I suppose it is sadly inevitable. So what do I think the politicians should do to prevent the next massacre like the one at Virginia Tech instead of arguing about gun control? Nothing. Let's face facts. One third of the nation is mentally ill. Of that hundred million people, there are probably at least 10,000 who are sick, twisted loners who are total losers with their preferred sex, prone to stalkerish behavior, and altogether too fond of really sick violent imagery. Heck, I've known at least two of them personally. Every eight years or so, one of those 10,000 people goes off. And there is still no way to predict which of those 10,000 people are going to go off, and no way to coral or herd or manage or contain or even disarm those 10,000 sickos without setting even more of them off than already go off. Learn elementary first aid, practice building evacuations, live a good and loving and full life, and if you have dependents pay your life insurance. Not because every eight years or so you have a one in 10,000,000 chance of being the victim of a rampaging mass murderer, but because you run a much higher probability of at least once in your life of being involved in some kind of random disaster, whether from dangerous weather, or other natural disaster, or a building fire, or an act of war, or any of a long long list of things that can go wrong in this life. Sometimes death just comes at random. Sometimes there just isn't anything useful we can do about that other than to do what you political carrion eaters aren't allowing us to quietly do instead of getting dragged into your pointless argument, and that's to comfort the survivors and rebuild. * Mood: aggravated -- Original Source: http://bradhicks.livejournal.com/328865.html licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution, NonCommercial, ShareAlike 2.5 License.
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Sunday, April 22, 2007 Topics like these are always hard to approach. For some, the event holds particular weight, either because of their relationship with the victims, with the assailant, with the location where it takes place, or because of the events relationship with another similar incident. The coverage of these events is usually the same. To provide the viewer with context- there is footage of the location from every possible angle, there are reporter stand-ups near the location providing a feeling of being well informed by the people "on the scene", there is video from security cams or other sources that allow an inside view of the event or of the lead up to it, and there is commentary, lots of commentary. In these ways, as is the case with much of news today, the coverage of such events can be compared to the coverage of a sporting event: Heavy on filler, and light on actual content. As of today, it's been almost a week since the incident, and coverage of the shooting takes up a giant share of the programming schedules of networks. With less that four or five (if that) big stories running at the same time, it is in the forefront of the news audiences mind. Like most tragedies, answers are what are sought after most, that and blame. And this is what takes up most of the coverage. There are investigations into the profile of the assailant, interviews by "experts" in the field, with witnesses, with family, with victims of other similar tragedies, with law enforcement, with neighbors, ad nauseam. We watch all of this and assume that somehow there can be meaning found once all the pieces are known. That if enough time is spent on it, answers will be found, that proper blame will be placed, justice will be served. This is a false hope. Tragedies like these happen all the time. Not all of them are covered. Not all of them are given the weight that The Virginia Tech Shooting has been given. This is not to belittle the severity of the situation, nor is it to undermine the pain that resonates from the news of such an event, or the loss of the survivors. What should be looked at however is how these events are covered in the news, and how it affects our understanding of them as a viewer. The news media does a great job of drawing connections between events in order to apply meaning. This event is connected with the Columbine shooting, as it is also a mass shooting in a school. Connections are drawn between the fear of terrorism, and the fear of an unexpected terror. The words "Terror", and "Terrorist" are thrown around wantonly. Particular weight is given to the assailant's status as an American, drawing further connections to the fears of an attack by a foreigner. It is put into the temporal context as being "the deadliest shooting in American History" or it is given by some news agencies even more gravity by being called a "Massacre", a "deadly rampage". What does it mean to be the "Deadliest", is the loss of ten victims more profound then thirty, or one? How many victims are required for it to be counted as a massacre? Are there particular characteristics that make a shooting a rampage, instead of a methodical series of executions? There is no litmus test for tragedy outside of personal experience. These titles are nothing more than advertising slogans and marketing catch phrases. They are designed to draw the audience in, to get them to pay closer attention to the coverage of one report over another, to boost viewer-ship and ratings. To help fill this content, the lions share of programming time is given to interviews with the "experts", the press conference, and news releases after the fact. Officials stand in front of a dozen microphones twice a day, stating that they have "no further information at this time" and "those questions can't be answered during an ongoing investigation". But some news outlets are quick to point fingers. To cast blame. Somehow talk show celebrities like Dr. Phil are considered experts into the mind of a killer by CNN, and is constantly referred to in order to gain insight into how this could happen, when in reality his role is one of familiarity. Dr. Phil is placed in front of the camera to draw in the viewer ship of his entire constituency. For countless American viewers, he is a trusted face that could help bring meaning to such an event. Witnesses are interviewed hours after the event. "How does it feel to be one of the only survivors?", "How did you escape?", "How does this affect you? These questions, while apparently directed to the witness, are really directed to the audience placing themselves in the survivor's shoes. "How would I handle this?" is the question. How can I learn from this? The reporter leans in and asks the obvious- "have you talked to anybody about this yet, are you seeking professional help?" Obviously not yet, they are in front of the camera. They are prevented from recovery so that the audience can gain catharsis and false closure instead. What is missed in all this is that we are all being exploited in some way in order to boost ratings and sell advertising space. The coverage is excessive, bordering on irresponsible. People are pulled out of the woodwork, their lives interrupted so that we can know what it was like to be in elementary school with someone who grows up to be a killer. We see a mother of a child who murdered dozens and then killed himself, and wonder why she is stunned and despondent. We "talk" to "experts" who say this is a gun control issue, that everyone should be armed. We hear from security experts who say it's because of a lack of police and security presence, and other similar people who are pushing their own agenda, not helping to inform on the subject. The audience wants to know what is happening out there. They want to know when they should be legitimately worried about something, and this is what they get instead; hyperbole, speculation, grandstanding and sensationalism. One particular interview strikes a nerve. A criminologist was being interviewed on a major network, and was asked how this could happen. Is it video game violence, easy access to guns, copycat crimes, bad parenting? The criminologist dismissed these easy scapegoats and answered in the only rational way anyone could. He said, that it is a combination of factors. Not every one is predisposed to criminal behavior like this, but under the wrong conditions an unstable mind can be pushed to commit horrendous things. The real problem is that the system is such that someone this unstable could slip through the cracks and not get the care and attention that they need to heal. The problem is the focus on violence in media after the fact, not before it happens. The problem is a society who would sooner cast blame on others than take care of their own, or that would blame lax immigration laws that would allow for someone like this to get into the country, instead of diligently pushing for a system where those with emotional and mental problems get help. But ultimately the problem is that no real meaning can be found in a situation like this. No matter how many laws are in place, or police are around, or security checkpoints we have, a troubled mind left unchecked, will find a way to follow through with their plan. The news agencies and the commentators will be standing by, ready to add their opinion to the pile, without ever providing solutions to the core societal problems that allow tragedies to unfold. The sound-bytes will search for meaning in a meaningless action. The viewer will tune in to try and add meaning to their understanding of the situation, drawing from the only resources that they have. The advertisers will reap the rewards of our attention. Change must take place in the way these types of things are covered in the news so that people can help to identify those that need our help before extremes of desperation are reached. A change in the way we look at tragedy must take place before meaning can be found. Tragedy and our fear of it must not be exploited for the profit by the news. We as the audience must demand more than empty rhetoric and facile coverage and questioning, bold red headlines and somber musical montages of mourners. We must demand more, of ourselves and of the news. Posted by nickdigital2.0 at 5:01 PM -- Original Source: http://alifelessmediated.blogspot.com/2007/04/news-coverage-of-va-tech-shooting.html Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 License.
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John and Elizabeth Edwards Statement on Virginia Tech Shooting
Apr 16, 2007 We are simply heartbroken by the deaths and injuries suffered at Virginia Tech. We know what an unspeakable, life-changing moment this is for these families and how, in this moment, it is hard to feel anything but overwhelming grief, much less the love and support around you. But the love and support is there. We pray that these families, these students, and the entire Virginia Tech community know that they are being embraced by a nation. There is a Methodist hymn that gave us solace in such a moment as this, and we repeat its final verse here, in hopes it will help these families, as it helped us: In our end is our beginning; in our time, infinity; In our doubt there is believing, in our life, eternity, In our death, a resurrection; at the last, a victory, Unrevealed until its season, something God alone can see. Our dearest wish is that this day could start again, with the promise of these young people alive. Knowing that cannot be, our prayer is for God's grace and whatever measure of peace can be reached on this terrible day. John and Elizabeth Edwards -- Original Source: http://johnedwards.com/news/headlines/200700416-vt/ Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0
John and Elizabeth Edwards / John Edwards for President
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[This is a copy of my initial reaction to the media coverage of the VTech shooting, posted on my Wordpress blog. Unfortunately both links are now defunct - I wish I had saved a page of the "godblessvtech" blog, because it was to me a poignant illustration of the possibilities of the Internet for creating and reaffirming community. At the same time, however, I was disgusted by CNN's use of digital media - particularly video - to create what I saw as a voyeuristic experience of the event.] "On the Ethics of Bad News" Posted April 16, 2007 http://zozer319.wordpress.com/ I didn't really hear about this until late tonight, partly because all the people working out around me at the gym with TVs had them on stupid MTV the whole time. Anyway, I just wanted to share with you all two remarkable (for very different reasons) things I found online when doing a search for some overview of the shooting. I send them in particular because they are both temporary postings but say an awful lot: First, a striking example of a good use of the Internet, not only to share information but as a sense of non-physical community. I found this blog (probably just set up today, for this purpose only, so not actually a blog per se) on Wordpress - it's just a list of names and people asking for information on whether the individuals listed are okay. http://godblessvtech.wordpress.com/2007/04/16/hello-world/ Scroll down to read the progression of the information gathering and messages left. Also note the amount of information gleaned from Facebook. Second, a striking example of outright voyeurism disguised as comprehensive journalistic coverage. In browsing CNN's coverage of the story, I was disgusted by the amount of video - not of interviews and re-runs of news stories, but the amount of direct footage of the shootings/events themselves; http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/04/16/vtech.shooting/index.html There is no clear line between information and too much information, but that might be close. Thank goodness I wasn't watching CNN today, or I probably would have got pissed off at them a lot sooner than now (not that it's just them... but if they bill themselves as the world's #1 news source I hope it's not too much to ask to hold them to some minimum standard). Anyway, that's all I've got. And get ready to hear about this one for weeks (not from me - from "The Media.") -- Original Source: http://zozer319.wordpress.com/2007/04/
Toal: Sensible gun laws only way to secure a safe future for US
This is a piece written by Gerard Toal, the NOVA-based Virginia Tech Professor. It was published in the Irish Times 28/04/07. The Irish Times 28/04/2007 Author: Gerard Toal Title: Sensible gun laws only way to secure a safe future for US The majority of students of Virginia Tech are doing something ordinary yet also remarkable this week: they are studying hard for their final exams. Working through the horrific murders of 27 of their fellow students and 5 of their faculty at the hands of a disturbed class mate, Cho Seung-Hui, the Virginia Tech community is refusing to be defined by a violent rampage that has shocked the United States and caused sorrow across the world. Virginia Tech is an institution of higher learning, a place where young people can realize their potential and, as the university slogan puts it, 'invent the future.' The return of students in large numbers after such a terrible crime is re-affirming this to the world. The loss of so many young lives on April 16th has shaken us all. A flotilla of media decamped to our main university campus in Blacksburg and recorded our shock and our tears. It has also encountered, in conversations with our students and faculty, our capacity to rally and persevere. As a Virginia Tech faculty member for eighteen years, I was gratified by two aspects of our response. First, Virginia Tech faculty and students correctly challenged the widespread use of the multi-media images produced by Cho Seung-Hui himself which were integral to enacting his fantasy of heroic 're-masculinization' through brutal violence. The complicity of the media in producing murder as fascinating spectacle is widespread across the globe. Second, amidst our pain, there was also human empathy for Cho's family and for those beyond our campus who suffer from structural and direct violence every day. The death toll in Baghdad last week was horrific. The Iraq war continues to claim the lives of young American soldiers, some tragically former Virginia Tech students. The daily death toll from gun violence across the United States is also horrific. In 2004, the New York Times reported this last weekend, an average of about 81 people per day died from gunfire across the United States. Some were suicides, others 'accidents' and the rest classified as homicides. In Washington D.C. in 2005, according to public statistics, there were 195 murders, the lowest number in recent years yet still a grim total for a city of only 550,521 people. Look for a rise in the future if the staunchly conservative US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia has its way. Last month, it struck down the District's restrictive handgun law opening the door to a broad roll-back of gun control laws across the United States, especially in its major cities (the decision is on appeal, and may come before the US Supreme Court). Marginalized by last Monday's horror at Virginia Tech was a large demonstration in Washington DC for congressional voting rights. Despite having a population almost as numerous as states like North Dakota (636,677), Alaska (663,661), South Dakota (775,933), and larger than Wyoming (509,294), this overwhelmingly African-American city has no Senators or Representatives with political voting power in the Congress seated within it. This matters significantly when it comes to gun control laws to promote public safety and freedom from random acts of madness. All of the states comparable to DC in population are power centers for those forces glamorizing guns and undermining existing gun control laws. National Rifle Association constructions of 'tradition' and 'rights' (words familiar to Irish ears) are blended with frontier mythology to sell guns, and lots of them, as necessary accessories of a supposedly 'free' lifestyle. Paranoid fantasies revolving around government conspiracies and invading outsiders are used to mobilize gun owners into political projects as single issue voters backing NRA-endorsed candidates. Gun laws are for sissies; real men pack heat. But there is no conspiracy, only the organized effort of the gun lobby, deeply entrenched in Congress, to thwart cities suing gun manufacturers for the devastation caused by their products, and to let the Clinton era assault weapons ban lapse. Under the Bush administration, a plethora of semi-automatic assault weapons are now available for sale to the general public. Last Friday, in the wake of the Virginia Tech rampage, the Democratic controlled House of Representatives passed a bill creating a new Congressional seat for Washington DC and, to attract Republican support, for Republican-leaning Utah also (most Republicans still voted against the measure). The measure was previously stalled by Republican efforts to attach a provision formally overturning the District's 31 year old ban on hand guns. The bill moves forward into the Senate where the over representation of rural states and the under representation of the interests of America's cities is most pronounced. It also faces a potential White House veto. Beyond this modest gesture, the Virginia Tech massacre has generated no serious political response. Politicians have run from the issue rather than face it, blaming university officials and campus security rather than their own complicity with making deadly semi-automatic weapons easily available. The Virginia Tech community reacted strongly against an initial media-driven desire to blame the university and its police force for the absence of a 'lockdown' of campus (as if an open campus should be like a prison). Petitions of support for the university president and police chief made it clear we were not accepting this easy 'blame-the-local-officials' strategy. Contrast this to how the Australian government reacted in 1996 to the massacre of 35 people in Port Arthur Tasmania by a deranged killer using a semi-automatic rifle. Within 12 days, the federal and state government agreed a ban on semi-automatic rifles and placed strict controls on other guns. The government also launched a large gun buy-back program. The result? Suicides and homicides have declined. In the decade before Port Arthur, there were 10 separate mass-shooting incidents; since, zero. The United States faces many difficult challenges today. Can the US state extract itself with dignity from Iraq and rebuild its international standing to more effectively thwart terrorism? Can it meet the challenge of global climate change after ignoring it for so long? Can the federal government create legislative solutions that provide adequate health care for all its citizens, as its population ages? And, while its leading politicians may not want to acknowledge it, the Virginia Tech killings renew the question: can the federal government establish meaningful control on handguns and assault weapons? These are profound challenges for the future. My hope and feeling is that some of those students studying hard at Virginia Tech, in the wake of a horrible tragedy, will be involved in inventing a better future for the United States of America, one where security is grounded in sensible gun laws and Virginia Tech is the name of an excellent university not a citation in a continuing list of murderous rampages. -- Archived with permission of the author.
We Need Emergency SMS Broadcasting Tools NOW!
April 16, 2007 It's been a dizzying day taking in the horrible news from Virginia Tech, just a few hours west of DC, with at least 30 people on campus killed by a lone gunman. I spent a good part of the morning running back and forth between NPR's digital media department, the offices of Talk of the Nation, and the central hub space shared by NPR's news team during emergencies. Now that I've had a chance to sit on the train, head back home from work, and think about what happened today, I'm already angered by one bit of news I hadn't considered earlier in the day: that approximately two hours passed between the first shooting incident and the later massacre in the classrooms. During that time, it appears that almost no communications went out, apart from several mass email informing students of a shooting incident earlier in the day. The first email went out just before 9:30am, just after the final shootings began in the classrooms: Subject: Shooting on campus. "A shooting incident occurred at West Amber Johnston earlier this morning. Police are on the scene and are investigating. "The university community is urged to be cautious and are asked to contact Virginia Tech Police if you observe anything suspicious or with information on the case. Contact Virginia Tech Police at 231-6411 "Stay attuned to the http://www.vt.edu. We will post as soon as we have more information." This was followed by several other emails: Second email sent at 9:50 a.m.: Subject: PLease stay put "A gunman is loose on campus. Stay in buildings until further notice. Stay away from all windows" Third email sent at 10:17 a.m.: Subject: All Classes Canceled; Stay where you are "Virginia Tech has canceled all classes. Those on campus are asked to remain where there are, lock their doors and stay away from windows. Persons off campus are asked not to come to campus." Fourth email sent at 10:53 a.m.: Subject: Second Shooting Reported; Police have one gunman in custody "In addition to an earlier shooting today in West Ambler Johnston, there has been a multiple shooting with multiple victims in Norris Hall. "Police and EMS are on the scene. "Police have one shooter in custody and as part of routine police procedure, they continue to search for a second shooter. "All people in university buildings are required to stay inside until further notice. "All entrances to campus are closed." If the gunman was at large, why on earth wasn't the campus in lock-down mode sooner? Why didn't they have any other form of mass broadcast, apart from the campus-wide email? At minimum, the campus should have had an emergency PA system. I don't care if you want to use shootings or tornados or any other excuse for making the investment, but every campus in America should have a basic PA system for any potential civic emergency. And I know I've said this each time a disaster has happened over the last couple of years, but why the hell don't we have an emergency SMS broadcasting tool that can be used to send warnings to every cell phone in a given area or to a given group? Please don't take this as yet another pitch for people to use Twitter or Jaiku or Mozes, because frankly I don't care what tool people use, as long as it's reliable, easy to manage and secure - and Twitter doesn't exactly meet those needs yet. It's a start, but there's a long way to go. Back during the Boxing Day Tsunami, the Swedish government was able to get the local phone companies to send an SMS broadcast to every one of their subscribers whose phones had recently sent out a signal emanating from Southeast Asia. While they weren't able to do it in time to save lives, it made a major difference in tracking down who survived and who didn't. If they're able to figure out a way to do that, why can't we figure out a way to allow schools and municipalities here in the US to send out emergency SMS broadcasts? There's no way I can know for sure, of course, but I would surmise that almost every student and faculty member injured or killed today had a cell phone on them when they were attacked. Imagine the difference a single text message could have made. We can wait and see if some dot-com company can come up with a tool that could be jury-rigged for such purposes. Or we could get off our asses and make the necessary investments to develop an serious SMS broadcasting tool specifically designed for emergencies, both for warning the public and coordinating first responders. How many more disasters will it take before we do take the necessary action? -andy Posted by acarvin at April 16, 2007 6:33 PM -- Original source: http://www.andycarvin.com/archives/2007/04/we_need_emergency_sms_broadcasting_tools.html Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0
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Monday, April 16, 2007 I broke down and turned on CNN to check out coverage of the Virginia Tech shooting. I see there and elsewhere, without really knowing the details from this morning's mayhem, that the media are turning to the question of what it all means. With the help of sociologists, CNN bloviator in chief Lou Dobbs is going to scrutinize school shootings. It's an unspeakable tragedy, of course, and what will come to distinguish it will be the awful, heartbreaking details to be revealed over the hours and days to come. But really: does this tell us anything about any aspect of our society that we didn't know before this morning? Or before Columbine? Or the Killeen, Texas, massacre? Or Oliver James Huberty's slaughter of the innocents at the San Ysidro McDonald's. Go ahead and jump in -- you can all think of an incident that fits. I'm not sure what any of these killings says, by the way, beyond the obvious: how violent the society is, how efficient firearms are at doing what they're designed to do. But regardless of the meaning, to me, these have come part of the landscape we live in, a little like earthquakes in California. You know they're coming; you know they could be devastating; but you never know when it's going to happen. Of course, unlike earthquakes, in theory, at least, there's the hope we might be able to do something to stop random massacres. After every one, there's lots and lots of talk; Lou Dobbs and his sociologists. Then -- then we move on, till the next time. Posted by Dan Brekke at 03:15 PM -- Original Source: http://infospigot.typepad.com/infospigot_the_chronicles/2007/04/force_of_nature.html Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 2.0
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Monday, April 16, 2007 My heart and prayers go out to all of the families involved in the senseless shootings at Virginia Tech. My understanding is that 33 individuals lost their lives in the massacre. What a tragedy! There is noting I can do or say that will make things any easier for those involved. I'm sure that we will hear gun control advocates ranting and raving about this unfortunate event demanding stricter gun control laws, but the gun(s) didn't do the killing, an individual pulled the trigger. Most likely, a very troubled individual planned and carried out the killings without remorse. I have been keeping up with the reports all day and I have heard various takes on the situation. A lawyer was interviewed and suggested that the person that did the killing probably played games like "Grand Theft Auto." Personally, I don't see the validity of such games in the first place. I have a much easier time justifying gun ownership than I do allowing such games to be sold in mainstream America. What do they teach our children? My wife and I were discussing these type games and she said that she had 4th graders that were already playing them. I can't imagine allowing a 4th grader to play such a game. 4th graders are not mature enough to play them. I'm not mature enough to play them nor do I have the desire. And the really bad thing is that when she asked how they got these games, some said that their parents bought them. I don't understand this. I just think that these violent immoral games hurt our society and as a result individuals place little or no value on human life. How sad! Fantasy games even the violent ones are just that fantasy. They do not resemble any form of true reality. I can justify these fantasy games with magic and dragons. I even like playing some of them. But these fantasy games are a far cry from games like "Hit Man" or "Grand Theft Auto". I don't foresee anyone turning into a dragon and devouring a class of innocent students. But I also believe in the freedom that our nation was founded on. As such, where do we draw the line? I just don't have the answers and I'm heartbroken about the entire event. Ultimately, it doesn't matter if we are for gun control or banning violent video games. Neither will bring back the students that lost their lives today. It's just all too ugly! What an unfortunate day! Once again, my heart and my prayers go out to the families. God Bless Them All! William Bishop (Bill) Technorati Tags: school_violence, shooting, videogames, virginiatech, lostjohns posted by WBishop at 4/16/2007 07:21:00 PM -- Original Source: http://lostjohns.blogspot.com/2007/04/virginia-tech-massacre.html Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 License.
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Case students, community show support for Virginia Tech
April 19, 2007 On Friday, April 20, dozens of Case Western Reserve University students and other members of the campus community became honorary "Hokies" in spirit. They wore maroon and orange - the Virginia Tech school colors - in a show of solidarity and support. To remember and honor fellow students, faculty, staff and administrators who lost their lives or were injured at Virginia Tech earlier this week, several of Case Western Reserve's student organizations joined together to create a large "card" and a campus photo. All members of the university community were invited to sign the card, offering heartfelt prayers and words of healing and remembrance to their peers in Blacksburg, Va. In addition to the card, a photographer stood atop Kelvin Smith Library to take a photo of Case Western Reserve community members wearing maroon and orange - forming the letters VT - on Freiberger Field. Both the card and the photo will be sent to the Virginia Tech Student Union with hope that it will be displayed there. Students also redesigned - overnight - the university's large "graffiti" wall behind Thwing Center, the university's own student union. The wall now features a large VT and the words "You are in our thoughts," signed with a university logo. Organizations involved in creating these efforts included: Undergraduate Student Government, University Program Board, Class Officers Collective, Interfraternity Congress, Panhellenic Council, Residence Hall Association and Media Board. Posted by: Paula Baughn, April 19, 2007 02:31 PM -- Original Source: http://blog.case.edu/case-news/2007/04/19/vatechsupport
Posted by Helena Cobban at April 16, 2007 04:33 PM Tragedy has struck the community at Virginia Tech, our state's "other" fine flagship university, which is located around 120 miles southwest of my hometown, Charlottesville. Apparently a single gunman went on a rampage there earlier today and killed at least 30 members of the university community-- most likely, most of them students. Obviously, this is a truly horrible blow for all members of the community there. Equally obviously, we know that communities throughout Iraq have been suffering blows as huge as this one-- or on occasions, even larger blows-- on a daily or almost daily basis throughout the past 3-4 years. Many communities in sub-Saharan Africa suffer from gun violence on this scale, too. And last week, Algeria, in North Africa, was the scene of two extremely lethal suicide bombings... Can we all unite in grief together, and in sad wonder at the senselessness of ultra-lethal weapons and the tragedy of their widespread availability and use in many different parts of the world? Can we unite in sad wonder at the depth of alienation and hopelessness that leads some people to engage in mass killings, even sometimes to the point of throwing their own lives into the project, as well? Can we unite with a commitment to support, help, and try to repair all those bereaved by these and other acts of violence? Can we unite around a strengthened commitment never ourselves to resort to violence, and to redouble our search for the nonviolent ways that always do exist to resolve any differences among us as humans? I have only been to Virginia Tech once. It was a magical half-day I spent there, in the summer of 2005. The Friends General Conference (FGC), which is the main body of 'liberal' north American Quakers, was holding its annual summer gathering in a small part of Tech's beautiful campus, which is built from flinty blue-grey stone in the incredibly beautiful foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. I wasn't a participant in the gathering, but I made a special trip there one evening to spend a few hours with my dear friend Misty Gerner, who was then in a fairly advanced stage of her cancer. Misty, her husband, and I walked around the beautiful lawns a bit, and had dinner at a small nearby restaurant. Then Phil (the husband) left Misty and me alone a while. We walked and talked a whole lot more. She was wracked with bouts of pretty intense physical pain but her spirit was radiant. I prefer to remember Tech's campus as the place where I talked with Misty on that sunny evening about life, death, love, God, justice, peace, and the Middle East... She died last summer. Maybe a little part of her still hovers over the Tech campus. If so I hope she can help to comfort the many shocked and bereaved people there today. God forgive us all for having let the spirit of violence permeate our communities and animate our actions to this extent. -- Original Source: http://justworldnews.org/archives/002479.html Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0
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The flag at Castle Point flows in the wind as students stand in memory of the dead at Virginia Tech. Original source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/bytenik/470838112/ Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 2.0
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Briana Gilmartin helps a fellow student light a candle in remembrance of the dead at Virginia Tech. Original source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/bytenik/470855687/ Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 2.0
Case Western Reserve University's students, faculty and staff dressed in maroon and orange and organized into a Virginia Tech logo. Case's student government and others organized this "human logo" on Friday, April 20 in support of the victims and the entire university. Photo courtesy of Case Western Reserve University
Permissions Contact: Laura Massie (laura.massie@case.edu)
By: Elizabeth Nowrouz Posted: 4/19/07 It has been three days since April 16. Three days since maroon and orange became not just a team's colors, but a show of courage and defiance in the face of a national tragedy. While the students, faculty and families struggle to pick up the pieces, schools like UMW are making every effort to just show their support. It has been called the Columbine of college, and international news is still saturated with images of the victims, the shooter and a campus in mourning. Many students at the University of Mary Washington, located just 200 miles from the Blacksburg campus, had personal connections to Virginia Tech. When senior Susan Alexander found out about the shootings, she immediately began contacting her high school classmates at Tech. It was not until the next morning that she discovered a close family friend was one of the victims. "She was in her French class," Alexander said. Reema Samaha was a Virginia Tech freshman attending class in Norris Hall on Monday morning. The two families had known each other for years, Alexander said, and "we would all spend our summers together." Alexander returned to her hometown of Centreville to find it "transformed." "There are signs and banners everywhere, because two of the victims were from there, but so was the shooter," she said. Junior Nicole Halloran, who organized a vigil Monday night and has helped plan another for tonight, had many friends and classmates at the school. "We should show solidarity," Halloran said. "This is one of the best and only ways to do that. This could have happened anywhere." In the hours after the events unfolded, there was already a second vigil planned, this one by senior Jennifer Welsch and junior Jessica Thiel. Thiel did not have any close friends or relatives at Tech, but felt she needed to pay her respects. The girls' Facebook group asked students to meet at the fountain in Palmieri Plaza at 9 p.m. "What if someone walked into my class and started shooting," Thiel said as she passed out candles to the quickly forming crowd. "It's a Virginia school, I had to do something." Thiel addressed the crowd, many of them wearing Virginia Tech colors, and asked them to form a circle and join hands. She began to pray for "the students who woke up this morning and thought it was any other day, who walked into class, but didn't get to leave." Thiel had barely begin speaking when the group from Ball Circle arrived at the fountain, and the circle grew to accommodate them. When the prayer was finished, the students, who had numbered over 200, passed a bucket of orange Gatorate powder around, each person emptying a scoop into the fountain. As a chorus of "Lean On Me" spread through the crowd, the water slowly began to turn Hokie Orange. Senior Kyle Ott, who attended Monday's vigil, had actually been in Blacksburg when the shootings took place. "My girlfriend goes to Tech, so I drive down Saturday afternoon," Ott said. "She had a meeting at 10, and the campus went on lockdown while she was there." Ott was not on campus, but could not get near because of the police. "I was concerned about her and that she'd go outside," he said. "A girl from her sorority was killed, but she was fine and I left at like noon." Though the responses have been mostly from students, many UMW faculty and staff had connections to the events as well. Jack Bales, the reference and humanities librarian, is the parent of a Virginia Tech student. His son Patrick is a sophomore there. Jack Bales spoke of his experience in an e-mail. "My son [called me and] asked me, 'Dad, have you heard the news,'" Bales said. "He told me about the first shooting." Bales' son lives in West Ambler Johnston Hall, the site of the first shooting. His dormitory, like the rest of the campus, was locked down after the second shooting. Families and friends struggled to get in touch with students at Tech all day. Cell phones stopped working early in the day, and so many of the victims' names did not come out until Monday night or Tuesday morning. Associate Vice President for Business and Finance Richard Pearce is a Virginia Tech alumnus and parent. His daughter Darcey, a senior at Virginia Tech, was out of the area on Monday, but Pearce himself was at Radford University, a 15-minute drive from Blacksburg. Pearce was at a function for accepted students at the university when he heard of the shootings. "Everyone there was just glued to the TVs that whole morning," he said "The crowd was just numb. Even in the dining hall, it was just quiet." Rick Hurley, vice president for administration and finance, who has assumed presidential duties, has been working with students and faculty to come up with an appropriate response to the events. His first action was to increase police presence on campus. "We weren't worried, but we wanted to send a message to the students," Hurley said. "We wanted to do what we could to give a higher level of comfort." Situations like this, Hurley said, always raise questions about local security. "We have a crisis management team that can come together at a moment's notice, as it did last week," he said, referring to the incidents with UMW President William Frawley. "We contact academic buildings and residence halls, and have the residence staff get in touch with as many people as possible," he said. "For a school as small as we are, we can do that. It's an old-fashioned system, but it works." Hurley has been working with students on campus to plan memorials to the victims. In addition to the state-wide vigil planned for tonight, Governor Kaine has declared Friday to be the national day of mourning. "We are hoping to set up a line of students from the bell tower to Goolrick," he said. "Everyone will hold hands and observe a moment of silence." "We all hear that we should not take our good fortune for granted," Bales said. "But until something like this happens, we all probably do."
Crime scene tape near Norris Hall that was blown away and then got snagged in a nearby tree.
Salem State College students, staff and others at a vigil on Monday, May 23 for Virginia Tech lined up to form the VT logo. The photo will be sent to the university as a show of support, along with signed banners and wooden VT logo symbols. Original source: http://www.townonline.com/salem/homepage/x109703597 Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5
Hundreds attend Salem State vigil for Virginia Tech
By Meghan Griffin/salem@cnc.com GateHouse Media Wed Apr 25, 2007, 09:36 PM EDT SALEM - The vigil held at Salem State College on Monday began with the most important thing, the reason some 300 students and faculty had assembled: the 32-plus victims of the Virginia Tech shooting. Michael Mitchell, president of the Student Government Association, started the vigil by reading each of the victims' names. "We will keep them in our hearts forever," said Mitchell. The students and staff who congregated on the lawn of Salem State's Central Campus were there to show their compassion and support in the aftermath of the Virginia Tech University massacre. The hundreds who gathered at Salem State held candles, and they were all outfitted in custom made T-shirts displaying the Virginia Tech logo on the front and the phrase, "Today We Are All Hokies," on the back in honor of the university's mascot. Candles lined the walkway leading to Central Campus, and empathetic students stood in groups as they tried to make sense of the tragedy. The disaster unfolded April 16, at Virginia Tech University in Blacksburg, Va. The nation was shocked to hear that a student open fired and claimed the lives of 32 innocent victims, including 20-year-old Ross Alameddine of Saugus, before turning the gun on himself. Salem State's commemoration began at 7 p.m., one week after the massacre. Mitchell, who played a large role in organizing the event, extended thanks to all those who helped organize the vigil, and to the Residence Hall Association for producing the T-shirts. President Nancy Harrington, who will retire at the end of the school year, addressed the situation and called the mayhem at Virginia Tech, "immeasurable." It is important for students to remain united in order to stay strong, she told the crowd. The vigil brought forward the realization that a disaster could strike unexpectedly at any time, and that no one is fully protected. "We hope and we pray that this is a safe campus," Harrington said, noting that there is no guarantee that such a tragedy will not occur in this violent world. "There is no real way to prevent something like this," Mitchell added. A recurring theme of the evening was the need for students to recognize those they may be alienating. Cho Seung-Hui, the student killer who went on the rampage at Virginia Tech, was reportedly a loner and outcast. "People shouldn't feel alone in this world," said Salem State junior David Overton, who addressed the crowd when the organizers asked if anyone wanted to come up and say a few words. Dressed in all black, Overton told the Gazette the shooting had a personal effect on him. After the 1999 high school shooting in Columbine, he said, he was questioned by teachers and others at his school. Overton, a resident adviser at Salem State, said there should have been parts of the community to help Cho Seung-Hui, and that all schools need to be prepared for such an act before it is too late. A few people, like Overton, chose to share their personal thoughts with the crowd. Jay Carey, a Salem resident and employee at the college's Center for Adult Learning, received an overwhelming applause after reading a poem he wrote about the incident. "It's a shame," he read, "that we only pull together in the rain." Students wrapped up the vigil by shaping a huge Virginia Tech logo on the lawn. Photographers captured the moment with aerial shots taken from the roof. Salem State plans to send the photo, along with five signed banners and two signed wooden Virginia Tech logos, to the Blacksburg school to show support. Harrington was impressed with the turnout. She credited Mitchell for spearheading the event, which was entirely student organized. "The tragedy at Virginia Tech touched everybody," she told the Gazette. Mitchell said they had to act quickly to pull together the vigil. "The purpose," he said after speaking to the crowd, "is to give people a chance to reflect." -- Original source: http://www.townonline.com/salem/homepage/x109703597 Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5
G-AHS students reach out to survivors of the the massacre at Virginia Tech
By Liz Vargo The Record Herald Published: Monday, May 21, 2007 10:08 AM CDT GREENCASTLE - When Greencastle-Antrim High School sophomore Kristin Reihart saw the massacre unfold at Virginia Tech in April, a chilling realization hit her - it could happen anywhere. "Virginia Tech was one of the colleges I considered going to," Kristin said. "If it happened two to three years in the future, I could be one of the students affected." So Kristin and three of her sophomore friends, Samantha Benson, Ashley Alleman and Tyler Sheeley, took it upon themselves to help. The four developed a plan for donations and presented it to high school administrators. During lunch periods last Friday, today and on Tuesday, the group will collect donations and sell T-shirts to raise money for the victims and relatives affected by the Virginia Tech massacre. "I can't imagine what they're going through," said Samantha. Making donations Any donations will go toward the Hokie Spirit Memorial Fund. Donations will fund grief counseling and communication with victims of the shootings and their families. Those who donate a minimum of $1 will receive a white, orange and maroon ribbon in memory of the lives lost at Virginia Tech. The students plan to make all the ribbons. The group also designed the T-shirts, which can be purchased for $10 apiece. The maroon shirt has orange lettering with the date of the shooting, April 16, 2007, and "Remember Virginia Tech" on the back. Shirts come in small through extra large. Kristin said it will take about a week to get the shirts made. Those who ordered T-shirts and received ribbons will wear them on the same day to honor Virginia Tech students and show support. Creating awareness Several local schools dealt with serious threats following the Virginia Tech shootings on April 16. Kristin and Samantha said it's scary to think about what could happen at home. "We're trying to bring awareness. We share in the pain of that community," Kristin said. "It's scary (when there's a threat) because kids don't know if it's really a threat or not," said Samantha. The students who threaten others or carry out terrifying events, like that at Virginia Tech, often feel they have no way out, Samantha said. Peer pressure and bullying make them look for another way to cope. Although G-AHS has not dealt with threats, students said they have seen bullying in the schools. "It's nothing major, but we want people to realize what happened and how people from that area feel," added Tyler. "We should feel for them." The students said other organizations raised money for victims, but they noticed nothing had been done at G-ASHS, so they started a fund-raiser themselves. "It's an amazing thing with the heart of these students," said assistant principal Ed Rife. "They pulled this together themselves. It's not for a class, it's all about making a difference." By showing their respect, Rife said the students created a way for the Greencastle "family" to help another family in need, he said. The project The fund-raising event took about three weeks to plan. Students met with the guidance counselor, then presented the idea to administrators. Samantha said many teachers commented they were proud the students organized the project on their own. No one used it as class or extra-curricular credit. T-shirts can be ordered at the high school office, 500 E. H St., or by calling 597-2186. To donate directly to the Hokie Spirit Memorial Fund, call 1-800-533-1144. -- Original source: http://www.therecordherald.com/articles/2007/05/21/local_news/news03.txt Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5
Tuesday, April 17, 2007 The Bill Muehlenberg Trophy: Debbie Schlussel and the Virginia Tech Shootings Just when you think the wingnut Right can't possibly get more insane or logic-deprived than it already is, along comes Debbie Schlussel, writing on the Virginia Tech university shootings. First, she blamed the Muzzies without a shred of evidence. Then, updating her blog entry after reports emerged that the suspect was a Chinese national, she wrote: The shooter has now been identified as a Chinese national here on a student visa. Lovely. Yet another reason to stop letting in so many foreign students. When the suspect was later more vaguely described as "Asian," Schlussel saw this as a golden opportunity to revive her "it-was-a-Muzzie-wot-done-it" thesis. (This will take your breath away) Why am I speculating that the "Asian" gunman is a Pakistani Muslim? Because law enforcement and the media strangely won't tell us more specifically who the gunman is. Why? Even if it does not turn out that the shooter is Muslim, this is a demonstration to Muslim jihadists all over that it is extremely easy to shoot and kill multiple American college students. Got that? (Once you've stopped bashing yourself senseless against the keyboard.) Regardless of who is actually responsible for the massacre, it's yet another reason to hate Muslims. Holy dogshit! How are we expected to take that side of politics seriously when it keeps churning out half-wits like Schlussel? (Via Pharyngula) P.S. Compare Schlussel's Islamophobic dribbling to Scott Poynting's thoughtful Perspective piece on Islamophobia and moral panic. UPDATE: It turns out that the gunman was a 23-year old Korean student, acting alone. Not that it makes a lick of difference to Schlussel. Maybe he's a Korean Muslim. Or maybe the Muslim centre of his brain was overstimulated. In any case, he's a foreigner. Foreigner bad. Muslim bad. Rinse. Repeat. UPDATE II: Guess who the creationists are blaming . . . UPDATE III: Guess who's planning to show up at the funerals of the slain students (via Pharyngula) UPDATE IV: Dinesh D'Souza claims that atheists don't care about the shootings. Why? Because Richard Dawkins "has not been invited to speak to the grieving Virginia Tech community." Shame on us atheists! Even Fred Phelps and his WBC mourning committee have the decency to pay their respects to the victims. (Pharyngula) Originally posted at Five Public Opinions