I have been thinking about the Virginia Tech shootings.
As nice as it would be for it to not be true, the fact is I am not normal. I come from a background that is - to be kinder on myself then most have been in my life - dark and filled with the taunts of the many who believed themselves to be better than I. While I - like any other mere mortal humans - am not perfect, I'm not all bad, and indeed I consider my giving nature and desire to help others a good aspect of my character that redeems any other faults I may possess.
Unfortunately, I'm also - regretfully - somebody who has the absolute capacity to be totally evil, uncaring, with absolutely no remorse or regret. This includes the common human ability to kill.
On that note, I can understand with perhaps too much clarity why a smart young man whom it would seem had a good future would do such socially unacceptable things. Many people can never understand how it feels to have a Demon growing inside of you that is fed not only by the hates and fears of others who deem themselves to be better, but also by your own doubts and fears. While I am glad of this fact if only due to the increase is psychopaths and killers it would cause, I can not help but wish that society at large could understand both sides of the coin instead of pointing blame solely on the person who finally pulled the trigger as a what they felt was a Final Solution.
The fact is I feel sorry for the poor victim. I wish I could have been his friend. Maybe then he would have never killed over thirty people before going for safety of that unknown blackness called death.
Just think about it for a second:
How many friends did this guy have?
How many of these Jock looking eye witnesses who reportedly had to fake death to survive long enough to be interviewed by the news crews knew this guy enough to be able to call him by name while being interviewed about having to huddle like cared little children under the bodies of the Fallen to simply survive?
How many people have leaked his name, saddened by the loss of there dear friend, trying desperately to show the world that the good they remember being a part of him was more then this event would show?
Zero.
Nobody cared, nobody was his friend. Nobody loved him enough to even try, to even ask him if they could help him or just hang out, give him a beer, give him a date, whatever, based on what I am seeing. And that was probably what he needed the most as he sat there on the floor barefoot making the list of things he needed to Make Them Understand How It Feels.
In the days to follow a lot will be said about the people who died. You will no doubt hear stories about there lives and how they died and hear tear felt last cell phone calls sold at a premium to the media outlets who even now are fighting over - an paying top dollar - for every last cell phone video of the event. Old boyfriends and girlfriends will tearfully recall that one time at the mall where that one guy/girl did that one thing, and it was SO FUNNY because like it was just so cool, and soon the topic will stray from the killer and you will just feel so good about the topic being on the people not the shooter, that you will let it happen and forget everything important.
But no matter what you hear, no matter what you are told by your friends after they regurgitate do you what they read on line, no matter what you are told by the reporters who get paid to do so, please remember one terribly important and vital thing: The shooter had feelings too.
He cried when he was lonely. He laughed when he was happy. He loved. And for some currently un-broudcasted reason, he did not feel loved enough by the multitudes of people around him to stop himself from choosing to premeditate and follow through with the killing of over thirty people before killing himself as the one and only way he could make things Better.
No one tried, no one cared, no one helped. I think he felt powerless, so he simply took the little power he could get by taking lives - including his own - in an attempt to prove to himself that everybody was wrong, that he was worth loving, worth something, worth anything more then what he had and felt was simply not enough worth living for.
Nobody should have to feel that way. Nobody should have to feel that lost, that worthless, that redundant, and I sincerely hope that he killed at least one of the people who made him hurt the most. If not, then in my humble opinion I consider this event to be even worse.
Unfortunately, I'm also - regretfully - somebody who has the absolute capacity to be totally evil, uncaring, with absolutely no remorse or regret. This includes the common human ability to kill.
On that note, I can understand with perhaps too much clarity why a smart young man whom it would seem had a good future would do such socially unacceptable things. Many people can never understand how it feels to have a Demon growing inside of you that is fed not only by the hates and fears of others who deem themselves to be better, but also by your own doubts and fears. While I am glad of this fact if only due to the increase is psychopaths and killers it would cause, I can not help but wish that society at large could understand both sides of the coin instead of pointing blame solely on the person who finally pulled the trigger as a what they felt was a Final Solution.
The fact is I feel sorry for the poor victim. I wish I could have been his friend. Maybe then he would have never killed over thirty people before going for safety of that unknown blackness called death.
Just think about it for a second:
How many friends did this guy have?
How many of these Jock looking eye witnesses who reportedly had to fake death to survive long enough to be interviewed by the news crews knew this guy enough to be able to call him by name while being interviewed about having to huddle like cared little children under the bodies of the Fallen to simply survive?
How many people have leaked his name, saddened by the loss of there dear friend, trying desperately to show the world that the good they remember being a part of him was more then this event would show?
Zero.
Nobody cared, nobody was his friend. Nobody loved him enough to even try, to even ask him if they could help him or just hang out, give him a beer, give him a date, whatever, based on what I am seeing. And that was probably what he needed the most as he sat there on the floor barefoot making the list of things he needed to Make Them Understand How It Feels.
In the days to follow a lot will be said about the people who died. You will no doubt hear stories about there lives and how they died and hear tear felt last cell phone calls sold at a premium to the media outlets who even now are fighting over - an paying top dollar - for every last cell phone video of the event. Old boyfriends and girlfriends will tearfully recall that one time at the mall where that one guy/girl did that one thing, and it was SO FUNNY because like it was just so cool, and soon the topic will stray from the killer and you will just feel so good about the topic being on the people not the shooter, that you will let it happen and forget everything important.
But no matter what you hear, no matter what you are told by your friends after they regurgitate do you what they read on line, no matter what you are told by the reporters who get paid to do so, please remember one terribly important and vital thing: The shooter had feelings too.
He cried when he was lonely. He laughed when he was happy. He loved. And for some currently un-broudcasted reason, he did not feel loved enough by the multitudes of people around him to stop himself from choosing to premeditate and follow through with the killing of over thirty people before killing himself as the one and only way he could make things Better.
No one tried, no one cared, no one helped. I think he felt powerless, so he simply took the little power he could get by taking lives - including his own - in an attempt to prove to himself that everybody was wrong, that he was worth loving, worth something, worth anything more then what he had and felt was simply not enough worth living for.
Nobody should have to feel that way. Nobody should have to feel that lost, that worthless, that redundant, and I sincerely hope that he killed at least one of the people who made him hurt the most. If not, then in my humble opinion I consider this event to be even worse.