VT Shooting: Whose Fault Is It, Anyway?
First, I will extend my condolences to the families and friends of those who died in this tragedy. If there’s some longshot chance that you haven’t heard about this story by now, here’s a primer:
At least 33 dead in rampage at Virginia college - MSNBC (fuck you, CNN)
A gunman killed 32 people in two shooting incidents Monday at a college in Virginia in one of the deadliest mass shootings in U.S. history. The gunman also was killed, and at least 15 other people were injured.
Now that that’s out of the way, it’s time to figure out who is responsible for this and sue the pants off them! FOX News was quick to jump on the Blame Bandwagon, bringing the ever-loved and reputable Jack Thompson on the air. Guess who he thinks is to blame?
It’s difficult to write this right now, because new information is constantly available. The focus of this story has shifted to why students and faculty were not warned in the two-hour interim between the shooter’s attacks, and details on what exactly happened on the campus is starting to emerge.
MSNBC-
The shootings, which took place in two locations on campus, came just four days before the eighth anniversary of the Columbine High School bloodbath near Littleton, Colo. They created panic and confusion at the college, where students and employees angrily asked why the first e-mail warning did not go out to them until the gunman had struck a second time.
This is a serious issue, one that opens a whole other can of worms about security on school campuses, especially considering how expensive college can be nowadays. And really, that should be the focus after mourning this incident- moving on to improve where the system failed here, and maybe waking up from that mentality that this sort of thing “couldn’t happen here.” Hopefully, this kind of progress is what will arise from this morning’s shootings. But the media’s immediate focus was pointing fingers on who’s to blame in the early hours of it breaking, as demonstrated by Jack Thompson appearing on Fox News as a “specialist” blaming videogames for this man’s violent rampage. Forget that Jack Thompson has literally NO clout left among anybody, forget that his cases against videogames has been thrown out practically (possibly literally) every time. Of all the “experts” on any number of fields, Fox brings on “that wacko that hates videogames” to tell its viewers that this is all videogames’ fault.
I understand that in this time of mourning and shock we’re looking for reasons as to why this happened, and what could have inspired this shooter to kill or injure over 50 students. But it’s hard to look for answers when we don’t even know who the shooter was. Maybe we should just let that go for now and grieve for the victims for a little while first? You know, show a little respect? Wait to draw conclusions about blame until the complete information is available? Nah. Fuck that. Bring in the Wheel of Blame, give it a spin, and throw it on the front page! (CNN, MSNBC, and FOX: feel free to contact us to license the Wheel of Blame.)
Funny thing is, these absurd accusations rarely stick; they are eventually dismissed. But there’s always an initial scapegoat — it’s never the shooter’s fault, and when it’s a minor it’s definitely not the shooter’s fault, nor the parents. It’s pretty much always video games, movies, or possibly little killer bunnies. The initial spin is rarely right, and you have to try again. Thank God it’s damn easy when you have the Wheel of Blame.
Edit: It looks like the shooter has been indentified. Unfortunately, he’s from South Korea, which negates the Wheel of Blame. Now people will just be clamoring about immigration and how we should keep all those [insert generic derogatory Asian statement] out of America.
Also, Youtube’s got video of Jack Thompson talking on Fox. He’s billed as a “School Shooting Specialist” and apparently because the shooting was premeditated, Cho must have trained many hours on videogames.
My favorite part was wheb the anchor hesitates at the end describing Thompson as a “specialist” and kind of trails off mentioning what policies and changes Thompson is constantly fighting for. What a shoddy way to pad the hours where no details were really emerging yet.
Comments
Leave a Reply