What Has Been Learned?
By David Cowan
Knowledge Beat
A year ago 33 students were killed by a lone gunman, not from a tower, a book depository (if you believe that), or any other great distance. This person proceeded on foot and with two hand guns was able to create a massacre bigger than the incident at Columbine or the shootings at Cal State Fullerton in the 1970s.
I remember sitting in my newsroom at Orange Coast College glued to my computer hastily trying to gather information for the publication of the weekly paper. I felt sick to my stomach the whole time.
I wasn't thinking about my deadline. I wasn't thinking about the dead or the living at the school in Virginia. I wasn't event thinking about the fall out and paranoia that would be coming in the following weeks. I was thinking quietly to my self, "today someone has set a new standard."
A new standard for horror. A new standard for the breaking point and the reaction. A new standard for things I never want to know.
The response was typical. Fear, paranoia, sadness, regret and over-reaction to a problem that was too late to be solved.
A year later I'm sitting at a computer, writing about the same subject.
We still don't know the exact reason for why these horrors have happened and why they keep happening. We still don't know why these people, these killers, do what they do. Maybe that's the biggest flaw in our assumption. Maybe they don't know either.
Read this article and ask yourself: how far have we come?
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2 comments:
As hard as it is to handle hearing (and reporting) about these events, I think the country is getting active about how to better protect its students. More and more people are getting educated about what to do and thats what matters.
It is true that the government is taking a more active role in students lives, however it seems as though their actions are mostly reactionary not preventative. While I do understand it is hard to predict the frustration in people's heads, I believe that there is still more that can be done to break down the stigma of going for help as an admission of sickness rather than a step towards wellness.
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