Virginia Tech

The events that occurred on the Virginia Tech campus last week were truly tragic and very shocking to the American psyche. When events like this occur, it feels people, specifically those attending college with an apprehension and unease that wasn't there before. People react to these types of events in many different ways. Many grieve. Others get extremely angry or scared. However, the vast majority of Americans start blaming. When Columbine happened, people turned directly to Marilyn Manson and gun control laws. It is only human nature. In the desperate attempt to understand the confounding people will fall back on any sort of explanation; even if such an explanation founders under the scrutiny of intense logic and reason. Much like the events after Columbine, the Virginia Tech massacre was barely over before the blame started. It was the gun stores that sold him the weapons, it was a lack of proper security on our college campuses, or it was violent videogames such as Counter Strike.

The campus police did everything that they could. They saw what they believed to be an isolated incident taking place in the dorm: an angry boyfriend snaps. They reacted the way they were trained to and properly. Virginia Tech is the size of the entire population of Kirksville, Missouri. Imagine if a couple people were gunned down in a house in Kirksville. Would we expect the authorities to immediately lock down the entire campus as a precaution? Would we expect them to recognize the situation as anything but an isolated incident? There is no way to fully prepare officers for such and incident. They just have to do the best they can.

It is true that it was wrong of the gun store to sell weapons to the killer given his background of mental illness. This should be reformed. But the fact of the matter is that he would have found some other way to get weapons if he were so inclined. Schools shootings take place in Canada, but are primarily done with rifles as opposed to handguns. Tightening gun laws is not the answer. Violent people are going to do violent things, despite what their resources are.

Further, blaming forms of media like videogames and movies is asinine. It is so easy to blame the obvious sources of violence images in our country and not even bother to consider any real research on the subject. Many studies have found that violent videogames can actually provide an outlet of individuals to express