<p>I was on a business trip very close to V Tech when this incident occurred. Many of the people at the business site I was visiting were graduates of V Tech or had kids at V Tech. The level of emotional involvement, including panic and fear for friends and kids was very high. My heart goes out to all those touched by this tragedy.</p>
<p>At the same time I listened to some of the news coverage and heard comments from local residents that were very disturbing. The TV news "reporters" worked every angle. They seemed intent on finding a scapegoat. The college President was the obvious target. There were accusations that he and the administration had ignored signs of instability for the gunman. The administration was blamed for not locking down the campus. The administration was blamed for not calling in the national guard. </p>
<p>It is a time for mourning. It is not a time to follow the pattern of the gunman and allow our emotions and anger to control our actions.</p>
<p>A 16 year old student at our local high school carried a pistol to school yesterday. He pointed it and threatened two other students in the parking lot during lunch. The he got in his truck and drove to a nearby gas station. when police approached him and ordered him to drop his gun, he put it to his head and pulled the trigger. He was transported to the hospital and pronounced dead. The media reported it was all because of a break-up with a girlfriend and that the student who was threatened had just started dating the girl. While all this was going on, the high school and 3 other nearby schools were put on lockdown. The father of the threatened student came out in the news today complaining that he wasn't immediately notified of the event so that he could have come to the school to pick up his son.</p>
<p>citygirlsmom, I think it's time we start talking about it.</p>
<p>People are talking about other aspects of the situation, especially the mental health aspects.</p>
<p>It's as though it's OK to say "To prevent future incidents like this, we need to make sure that all people with mental illnesses who might shoot large numbers of people are locked up where they can't get their hands on guns."</p>
<p>But it's not OK to say "To prevent future incidents like this, we need to make sure that guns are made less available so that people with mental illnesses who might shoot large numbers of people can't do so."</p>
<p>Packmom: My daughter text messaged me at school today because her school was also put on lockdown but she didn't know why. She text messaged ME to see if I could find out why....then she was reprimanded by her teacher for using her cell phone to contact me because she was frightened about what might be happening at her school. I checked the local news via the internet and found out about the situation at your school and let her know the lockdown was just a safety precaution for our area schools.</p>
<p>Our thoughts and prayers go out to the family of the boy that took his life and to the other students that were involved, and yes the parents of the two students that were threatened should have been notified immediately.</p>
<p>edad: VT did all they could do AFTER the fact, but after the fact is too late. Several F.B.I. officers have said the very same thing, something more needs to happen before a situation like this gets to the point of calling for local police and the SWAT team. It is nice that the community is standing by the college and it's president, but who is standing by and speaking up for the innocent victims? Something more needs to be done to ensure that our children do not have to fear that they are sharing a dorm room with someone that might be insane and evil enough to be plotting another college massacre.</p>
<p>The anger and frustration that some of us feel knowing that this maniac was allowed to walk the halls of VT harrassing others and even causing a professor to feel threatened is understandable. It should not be likened to the anger and emotions of the shooter......what we are feeling is normal and rational. It will take time and persistance but I think we will see that some things could have been handled differently and some changes will be made because that is the only good thing that could come out of this tragedy.</p>
<p>I would definitely allow my son (soph -hs) to attend Va Tech. I have been so impressed with the students and faculty who have been interviewed by the press at this difficult time. As far as the students already enrolled coming back next semester, that would be a much more difficult decision. I guess it would depend on how the individual student and how close they were to the victims, where they were during the shooting, etc......</p>
<p>National Review Online--why blame the college, when you can blame the students?</p>
<p>
[quote]
Where was the spirit of self-defense here? Setting aside the ludicrous campus ban on licensed conceals, why didn't anyone rush the guy? It's not like this was Rambo, hosing the place down with automatic weapons. He had two handguns for goodness' sake—one of them reportedly a .22.</p>
<p>At the very least, count the shots and jump him reloading or changing hands. Better yet, just jump him. Handguns aren't very accurate, even at close range. I shoot mine all the time at the range, and I still can't hit squat. I doubt this guy was any better than I am. And even if hit, a .22 needs to find something important to do real damage—your chances aren't bad.
[/quote]
--John Derbyshire, a regular columnist for the site.</p>
<p>So now we know the dead students and teachers were cowards. Does it get any more dispicable than that?</p>
<p>Garland - Derbyshire is also flat out wrong. Reports have been made about a very brave student (one of the cadets) who rushed this the killer in an attempt to save others. He struggled with the murderer, who somehow managed to get off a shot to his head, killing the cadet instantly. Couple this with other stories - such as the professor from Romania, and there was plenty of bravery to go around. </p>
<p>Keep in mind that most of the murderer's victims were engaged in test taking when he came into the classroom. Given the focus and concentration required by tests, there could not be a more vulnerable group than those test takers in classrooms with limited egress. </p>
<p>And oh - I absolutely would send my kid to Tech. I absolutely have been impressed over the years as to how they care for their students, and this incident will reveal just how much they do. Tech is hurting right now, but they will soon be back to what they normally are - competence, hard work, old fashioned values, and a sense of community in that rural town that is unusual in today's world.</p>
<p>Somehow we just have to do something to prevent this type of tragedy. And who is responsible for a war in Iraq that has killed tens of thousands of people. And where are the weapons of mass destruction and what is our excuse for this war?</p>
<p>Mam--just hard to believe anyone could write (or publish) that tripe. There is also the heroic story of the Holocaust survivor professor who barred the door (dying in the process) so his students could escape out the windows.</p>
<p>Edad--171 people killed in bombings in Baghdad yesterday. I guess Derbyshire would say they were somehow responsible.</p>
<p>If I had a child who was in love with Va. Tech, I would encourage him or her not to be scared away by this incident. This very sick young man could have been anywhere. In fact, I attended grad school at UT not too long after another very sick young man, Charles Whitman, climbed up into a tower behind our building and sprayed bullets on all who walked by. That was 40 years ago; it was an isolated incident and Austin has never suffered another similar incident. While I know there was longlasting impact on the lives of individuals and families, for better or for worse, the institution went on, as wonderful a place as ever for the majority of the students.</p>
This has got to be one of the most tasteless, thoughtess posts I've ever encountered on CC. How you can choose this moment and this tragedy to further your particular political agenda is beyond me.</p>
<p>"I think I disagree with this. I think one reason urban campuses are so popular is this very reason. Lots to do and no need for a car. Drunk driving by students much less an issue for urban life students. I know plenty of kids who were guided away from suburban and rural campus due to propensity to have cars and drive toward the fun."</p>
<p>Coming at it from the angle of a person who lives in NYC, where for years we had homeless, mentally ill people living on many street corners and where "advocates" for the homeless worked against governmental intervention to keep those mentally ill from, say, freezing to death,and as a person who lost a sister to suicide due to lifelong mental illness, I have very mixed feelings here. I'm a conservative and treasure privacy and liberty, but I do think there are some (many?) mentally ill people who really don't have the ability to self govern. I know that's harsh and I will probably be stamped on, but I think VA Tech did all it could and more to prevent this tragedy, from the prof who taught him privately to get him out of the class, to the police, etc., but he needed to be institutionalized and not living in dorm. I don't blame the school one bit. They tried. I wonder where the parents were? Believe me, I know better than most people how tough it is to parent a mentally ill kid, but parents are the first line of defense. Ultimately, I don't think this could have been prevented, but we need to have the painful discussion about mental illness, about who is suitable to live in a dorm, and about when a community has such a compelling interest that a mentally ill person's rights have to be curtailed. It's easier to rail about gun control because the other is too painful.</p>
<p>sjmom, it was not my intention to further some political agenda.</p>
<p>I do think we need to mourn this tragedy but not react in an irrational fashion. If we are looking for corrective actions, we might first consider the deaths, maimings and destruction due to alcohol and drugs, campus suicides and even beyond our decision to wage wars.</p>
<p>My first question is why was this "identified as troubled" senior housed with underclass students? At the very least I think the university would have considered more carefully housing that might have provided greater security for all.</p>
<p>"I do think we need to mourn this tragedy but not react in an irrational fashion. If we are looking for corrective actions, we might first consider the deaths, maimings and destruction due to alcohol and drugs, campus suicides and even beyond our decision to wage wars."</p>
<p>edad, I think you're 100% right. I already raised the issue of car accidents and other serious threats earlier in the thread. And when we see our own young people senselessly massacred and wonder whether we could have done more to keep them safe, it ought to make us think harder about communities in other countries that experience senseless massacres like this every single day, and we should be wondering whether we could have done more to prevent those innocent deaths as well.</p>
<p>The fact that we can afford to give so much attention to these tragic deaths is an important reminder of how extraordinarily fortunate and safe we are in this country relative to countless millions of our fellow humans. Every tragedy we experience close to home is an opportunity to greater appreciate and empathize with the suffering of others.</p>
<p>As far as edad's post goes, we in America tend to act all uppity when some of our own are killed, but are pretty complacent when people in other countries are killed....</p>
<p>We spent almost as much time talking about Anna Nicole Smith in the news as we have on this event.....yet relatively little on circumstances that have resulted in the deaths of tens of thousands....</p>
<p>OUr outrage is what makes the two discussions relevant, we act as if our children are so much more valuable than those in Iraq, how arrogant can we be, pretty darn arrogant and self obsorbed as a nation</p>
<p>This is not about the families of those of VT, this is a collective mindset that our lives are so much more important than others are throughout the world</p>