CNet:

Two Harvard researchers have concluded that there’s no data to support the notion that violent video games cause the kids who play them to act out violence in real life, contrary to the vast majority of media outlets that would have the public thinking otherwise. The $1.5 million study, which began in 2004, closely examined 1,200 children after bouts with violent games like Grand Theft Auto and not-so-violent titles like The Sims.

Psychologists Lawrence Kutner and Cheryl Olson found that for most kids, playing these games was nothing more than a stress reliever… Some researchers, including the Harvard psychologists, even suggest that video games have a positive effect on the brain.

Kutner and Olson have written a book, Grand Theft Childhood: The Surprising Truth About Violent Video Games, which they discussed recently on On The Media:
Read the rest of this entry »

A year after the massacre at Virginia Tech by the troubled Cho Seung-Hui, what has been done to address the root causes of that event - the worst at any American educational institution? Dietmar Ostermann writes for Germany’s Frankfurter Rundschau, “The debate over gun control erupts loudly and often, yet it’s a discussion without consequences. The way people with psychological problems are handled, however, is a silent scandal. Even after Blacksburg, American society is so uncomfortable with the topic that it was quickly suppressed.”

Ostermann goes on, “Even more than the U.S. mania for weapons, this bloody killing spree represents the often tragic consequences of a system in which mental suffering is not only ignored - it is criminalized.”
Read the rest of this entry »

Bizarre is one of the most misused words in the news media, and CNN really hit the ball out of the park with this one:

“A firearms dealer in Green Bay, Wisconsin, Friday confirmed a bizarre link between the graduate student accused of killing five people at Northern Illinois University and the gunman in last year’s deadly shootings at Virginia Tech.

“A Web site used to buy gun accessories by Steven Kazmierczak is owned by the same company that operates a site patronized by Seung-Hui Cho, the company said.”

A coincidence perhaps, but there is nothing remotely bizarre about the link. It often times is easier to purchase firearms and firearm accessories in the U.S. than alcohol, cigarettes or birth control products.

What is bizarre is that so many people refuse to acknowledge that there is a link between the daily gun mayhem in the U.S. and the ready availability of the means to that end.

And while we’re at it, isn’t it bizarre that in our society the solution of the first resort for almost anything that ails you is to pop pills instead of trying to work through the problem, and yet an unfortunate number of people do extremely awful things like Mr. Kazmierczak when they stop popping them?

UPDATE: It’s been determined that one man wounded five persons and murdered four persons at both churches which are about 60 miles apart. Matthew Murray, 24, a home-schooled son (one of two brothers) of a priminent Denver family did the shooting. Murray was five years ago an ‘associate’ At the Missionary Training Center, but was found ‘healthwise’ unfit for assignment after the 12 week training for missionary work. That Missionary Training Center was the shooter’s first target, befre he traveled to the other churxh and unleashed more mayhem. Today, the Director of the Center said Murray was believed to have been sending hate mail to the Center. Murray’s father is a neurologist and a prominent multiple-sclerosis researcher. More on the story here

At the New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Murray killed two sister, ages 16 and 18. Their father was also wounded twice and is in hospital.

The story of the female security guard who killed the shooter, Miss Jeanne Assam, is here… “Security Guard: ‘God Guided Me And Protected Me’”

Today there were incomprehensible deadly shootings at two different churches in Colorado

…one shooting took place just after midnight in the youth dormitory at the Missionary Training Center, in Arvada, Colorado, a city just northwest of Denver.

There, the gunman shot dead two young people in their early 20s, one from Alaska and one from Minnesota. The gunman also seriously wounded two other young people there, one from South Dakota.

All were in a Youth Worship Mission together and were cleaning up after a Christmas party. Their pictures were flashed on television. Many tears. The police were unable to find the shooter.

…The other shooting took place today as noon services were ending in Colorado Springs at the New Life Church, also called by some, The New Life Megachurch, that has 14,000 members, 350 employees and a huge ‘campus.’

The gunman opened fire there (it may be the same gunman that was in Arvada earlier, but this is not confirmed) and killed two persons, one a teenage girl. He shot three others who are in hospital with life-threatening injuries.

The New Life Church had taken an extra precaution after hearing about the Arvada incident earlier in the day.

A female security guard on the scene at the Colorado Springs church, shot the killer dead. (She is currently lauded for saving lives. This is all the info that has been released about her thus far, the sheriff only referring to the guard as ‘her’.)

Now come more televised pictures of the victims’ yearbook photos. More tears. Sheriff with badge. News conference/ gaggle of mikes. Brave. Contained. Tragedy. People in Michelin Tire Man parkas embracing in the freezing cold. Steam rising as network affiliate reporters report. Governor’s message. Senator’s message. People shake when they try to speak.

The New Life Megachurch has had difficult times this past year as it is the church founded by Pastor Ted Haggard, who was let go for engaging with a homosexual prostitute. Haggard was, nonetheless, popular with his church members, and the church was recovering.

Focus on The Family run by James Dobson, is just down the road in Colorado Springs. No doubt the reverberation of this tragedy reached them quickly.

Meanwhile, across the nation, in basements, garages, bedrooms, cellars, attics, living rooms, other disturbed persons write the next or the last entry in their journals of screed. They count and recount the ammo one more time. They know, they just know they are going to abate Evil and set things Right in the world. They use Mapquest to figure out how to get to their targeted ground zero. Perfectly functional, can drive a car. Perfectly deadly, sick as rabid dogs.

And no one notices. Or tries not to. Or says, not my problem. Or says, well, we’re all a little odd. Or just stays away and hopes for the best.

I can only say, that once again, likely the person or persons who were the shooters at the churches, will have had a history of instability that too many did not recognize for its homicidal and suicidal nature, or misinterpreted the severity of what they were seeing.

Personal freedoms are so highly cherished in our country, that sometimes, people do not want to try to interfere, even when they know someone is quite mad and NOT harmless.

In California, even when a person suffering from severe mental illness poses a clear danger to themselves or to others, there are laws that prevent sincerely concerned others from helping the severely ill person get the help they need.

Is it such in our culture that in order to avoid ‘the slippery slope’ of people perhaps wrongfully being detained for a ‘mental health hold’ by their grubbing relatives, that we have accepted continual and unceasing mass murder by seriously disturbed people? Is this the only trade?

Half a century ago, TV created a new kind of American assassin, one who would escape insignificance by killing someone famous–a President or a star like John Lennon–and become famous for doing it.

Now we are in a new phase of this madness, where quantity has replaced quality in selecting victims. After yesterday’s random killing of eight people in an Omaha mall, police report finding a suicide note from the 19-year-old shooter, who had been fired by McDonald’s, saying he was going to be famous.

He joins the Virginia Tech rampage killer who left self-pitying videos in achieving notoriety through mass murder. Perhaps this new stage of insane fame was inevitable. Arthur Bremer, who was just released after 35 years in prison, wanted to assassinate Richard Nixon but settled for Gov. George Wallace because the President was too well-guarded. It’s so much easier to kill numbers of people at random.

In our grief, perhaps we should do with these sociopaths what the media do with rape victims, withhold their names, certainly not to protect them but to deny them the fame that motivated their savagery. It’s the least we can do out of respect for the victims.

Cross-posted from my blog.

How it goes.

After the massacre at Columbine High School in Littleton Colorado in 1999 where 12 students and one teacher were murdered by high school seniors Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold (who then killed themselves)… many people in the community, in the nation and in the world wondered could more people have been saved? What happened to spread the alarm? Who heard it, who did not? What was the students’ response? The teachers’? What should have been set in place long before? There were many other questions. We might have one more small answer now.

Today, an extraordinary film was released by CNN, a home video made yesterday by a Cleveland Ohio student, Warren Marks, of his teacher and classroom of students at his Success Tech Academy when a ‘code blue’ was called over the loudspeakers. The students in Mark’s math class didn’t realize it, but at that moment, one of their classmates was loose in the school with a loaded firearm.

The students as shown on the video are very slow to react to protect themselves. Precious time is lost until what appears to be an alert teacher climbs up and stands on a desk trying to quiet and focus the raucous students, shouting at them that this is not a joke, to stop laughing, this is to be taken seriously.

More moments before the message sinks in; til the students organize and finally lock down in the classroom. This chaotic and slow response comes in part from the students not immediately having enough specific information about the threat.

For many persons in general, when confronted with alarm, it’s a knee-jerk reaction to initially question or disbelieve there’s a real threat. Despite old media which no doubt will now seek out students who have been proximate to violence before and portray that as ‘the norm’, most students reacted normally… they still expected the inside of the school to be a protected place.

Asa Coon, the troubled 14 year old student who was the reason for the ‘code blue,’ subsequently shot two teachers and two students, and then took his own life. One teacher was shot in the back, one in the chest; the latter teacher having now had surgery and being listed in ‘fair’ condition.

We know the drill.
1. Troubled student
2. Students complained about the student
3. Teachers brought the issue forward
4. Evidence of ill intents found in troubled student’s writing, video, artwork
5. Others tried to intervene but were not supported
6. Other attempted to install precautionary rules /devices in school system
7. Nothing effective accomplished
8. Student gave warnings of impending homicide/suicide
9. Student had known serious mental distress
10. Student kept falling through cracks in terms of containment, help.
11. Harassment, ridiculing, scorning confrontations against/ with troubled student continue by others.
12. Firearm obtained
13. One last straw occurs
14. Psychotic break
15. Murder, suicide.

Everyone in shock.

As well they ought be. The dirty secret is that Read the rest of this entry »

Pastor Fred and his crew of self-styled Baptists who like to show up at funerals of gays, military and disaster victims, carrying signs saying God Hates You, and bellowing over bullhorns about how happy God is to murder human beings. He’s back. Again.

They say decent Christians never speak out against others who hold themselves out to be ‘the one and only true Christians” whilst causing mayhem and murder of the soul left and right. They say Christians are silent, and do not speak out against the criminalities of their own kind. That they’re all log-rolling. That they’re all scratching each others’ backs.

Alright!, I’m Speaking. I just hope it’s alright if I am one of the most imperfect Xtians who ever walked the face of the earth: there’s a reason St. Peter and all his comedic stumbles and all the other fool-saints are my favorites. Some Christians cheer when the Golden Calf is destroyed. I cheer when Moses strikes the rock more than once. I know just how he felt… If one is good, maybe twice is better…

Ok, deep breath, Here’s what I have to say, and every person who follows the faith knows the point of Christianity is not to argue about who is or isn’t G!d. (G!d, just as an aside, I’m asking you… don’t You get tired of all that prattle about which human version of G!d is the right one? If I’m hearing right, G!d just said, “It’s given Me eternal ennui.”)

In complete seriousness, the radical root of Christianity is to strive to serve the G!d of Love, not of Hatred, to try as hard as one can to follow the G!d of Life, not the god of blood sacrifice. Those are the elemental roots of Christianity. Yet, some Christians try to poison the rootstock with their incessant self-serving, sanctimonious, insufferable shtick of shilling for a God… named after themselves.

So, I call on the journalist Matthew, the oddest gospel writer, a former tax collector, who probably knew hypocrites and lying sacks of swine-swill better than anyone… Matthew, who said it better than I ever could… Here: from Book of Matthew:
“Many will say, ‘Lord, Lord did we not prophesy in your name?
Did we not cast out demons in your name?
Did we not perform miracles in your name?’
And the Lord will say unto them,
‘Depart from me you! you workers of iniquity.
I never knew you.’”

I know. A date for Confession with Father Loba this Friday before Mass. I know. I’m going. Confession is often enough just the sacramental pinch of wasabi needed to clear the mind and start sharp again…

In the meantime, viz: Pastor Fred and Co, whom I sense already has a ceiling-high pile of chits in heaven each one saying the same thing, something like, “We never knew you in G!d’s name.” Nonetheless, Fred and Co. have roamed pretty much at will for many years across America doing their crooked best to harm others’ spirits and minds and souls.

Except this time, the State of Minnesota and many others, are ready for Phelps and family.. the Phelpsian “Thank God for 9-11″ people.

See previous TMV posts on Phelps and Virginia Tech Funerals, here…
Jason Steck http://themoderatevoice.com/religion/christianity/other/14436/answering-phelps/

Dr. E at TMV
http://themoderatevoice.com/religion/12995/fred-phelps-and-his-god-hates-you-church/

and

http://themoderatevoice.com/religion/12273/virginia-tech-protection-needed-as-with-columbine-funerals-and-memorial-services-pastor-fred-is-coming-to-spread-his-screed-at-vt/

In the last 8 years especially, there have been many inroads into holding Fred and other kinds of indecent ‘religious’ intruders at decent bay. At Columbine memorial after the massacre, we were benumbed and the media satellite trucks, looking like space stations, huge… were parked trochimochi all over the lawns and sideways on hills

… and they couldn’t get enough of Fred and The Fredettes. (I know, I know. I’m writing that down on the sin list for Confession, too.) (Note to TV media: if you must, run archival film re Fred from the networks, don’t make new film, what are you thinking?)

So, we in The Rockies weren’t prepared for Fred with his signs held by family, “GOD HATES COLUMBINE.” But… since then, April 1999, people are much more savvy and are ready for Fred in advance. . Here’s how…

1. The legal eagles, such as The Southern Poverty Law Center, and other groups, keep a legal eye on hate-groups, and file suits, amicus briefs, enjoin cases, give support to knocking the stuffing out of ill-doers whenever they can. This includes Pastor Fred and gaggle. (venial sin, right there)

2. Interestingly, the Southern Poverty Law Center also has remarked that the following folks have been more effective than legal means in cases having to do with desecration of military funerals: Bikers, viz Patriot Guard riders have been drowning out Phelps’ protests cum bullhorns for well over a year now, by standing as patriot guard at funerals of military vets.

Phelps bleats that (venial sin, that word ‘bleats’) God killed the vets as punishment for homosexuality. The Phelps’ clan of juris degree educated, from Bob Jones University it is said, still stand around military funerals with their placards, and with their very young children of the clan given hate signage to hold up too… and the Patriot Guard riders if need be, rev their five ka-jillion CCs of road thunder, as needed to drown out Fred bellowing somewhere over the hill.

3. Trading evils. Choosing the lesser of two evils is still choosing evil. But life forces the hand sometimes. You decide. At Virginia Tech and at New Orleans, and a few other places, Mike Gallagher and other radio hosts, have offered, i.e., traded the Phelps’s out of their treachery by offering them a couple hours on radio if they’d pull back their protests. Which Phelps did.

Phelps’ real point seems not to be high-principled protest. Rather, as my dad used to say, (he didn’t mean it this way, but he was an immigrant who had a tenuous hold on the English language) the Phelps’s point seems to be to lurch over to ‘the slime-light’ whenever possible. Mike Gallagher; another story for another time.

But he and other radio hosts acted as an effective hindrance to the Phelps’s. I’ve listened to the broadcasts. I’m sorry to say, I think it might be best to wear a Hazmat suit for your soul, while listening. (teeny tiny venial sin there, maybe. I’ll have to consult with Father about that)

4. Minnesota is one of the states that is ready, before the fact. They passed a little law that went into effect in May of 2006, that makes it against the law to trespass, disrupt or not obey the rules set out, with regard not only to military funerals, but to any funeral. Relatives can sue for damages as well.

You can read the brief but humane Minnesota statute on the next page, that protects the souls and spirits of the relatives of the deceased and engenders respect for lives lost. All the ‘funeral sanctity’ laws enacted across the United States, mainly in response to Phelps are amazing documents; they protect the psychology of, the spirits and souls of the family of the deceased.

Also here you can read Fred’s intents for Minneapolis… yes, he sends out press releases, telling his philosophy of… um, well, again, you decide… http://www.ericblackink.com/

I have to excuse myself from you now. I have to go do what we call ‘interragatio sanctus’ an examination of one’s life. Here in this article, I don’t know what Fred’s motives are underneath his screed. My motive, I do know… to put out hopeful markers for what is being done that works against people bent on tormenting others, and to offer, I hope, a small reason for smiling for a moment for those who are rowing through this difficult time. A tiny bit of humor often beckons the life force to flash for just a moment, letting us know we’re still alive. Just right.

Read the rest of this entry »

These teachers should be ashamed of themselves and should be fired immediately. What a bunch of idiots.

Staff members of an elementary school staged a fictitious gun attack on students during a class trip, telling them it was not a drill as the children cried and hid under tables.

It was, according to the teachers, meant as a “learning experience.”

Good, lets turn this into a learning experience for the teachers as well. The lesson they have to learn: doing stupid things like that results in your firing.

The children will, most likely, be haunted by nightmares for days, for some even weeks and / or months to come.

Cross posted at my own blog.

A haunting tribute to the Virginia Tech victims written by Evanmusic and posted on You Tube. He writes:

It is to send a message of healing”:

The TV, replaying like a broken record.
The image, it’s numbing, another record broken.
More questions, no answers, left to imagination
Alarming, disturbing, what are the implications?
All as one and all at once, we ask why they had to die

There’s no sunset in Virginia
The Earth is standing still
The mighty may have fallen
The pain never will
There’s no sunset in Virginia
The pain is in our eyes.
But if there is no nightfall
The sun will never rise

The candles are burning, blocking out the darkness
By thousands they flicker, light and sorrow linger
The silence is deafening, reliving consternation
Reminder, that violence cut short their aspirations
Now as one, we take a vow: protect the light for better days to come (refrain)

All as one we’ll look up to the sky to remember all the ones we left behind.
As the sun begins to set the sun will set us free.

You Tube — and humanity — at its best...

For the most part, I caution against over-reacting, but there are some cases where restraint may be in order.

Joe has already addressed Newt Gingrich’s claim that liberalism is to blame for the Virginia Tech shootings, but here, below, are my thoughts in response to that idiotic claim.

**********

In case you haven’t heard, Newt Gingrich has found the cause of the Virginia Tech shootings. Or, rather, he has found something upon which to pin the blame:

Liberalism.

Yes, that’s right. Liberalism.

On ABC’s This Week on Sunday, he blamed the shootings (and such violence generally) on video games, what he called “dehumanization,” and “the fact that we refuse to say that we are… endowed by our creator, that our rights come from God”. Stephanopoulos pressed him — “what does that have to do with liberalism?” — but all Newt could come up with was a rambling, incoherent mess that included “situation ethics,” “the use of language which is stunningly degrading of women,” and McCain-Feingold. Yes, McCain-Feingold. While political speech is being restricted, he claims, “it’s impossible to restrict vulgar and vicious and anti-human speech”. (Crooks and Liars has the video/transcript. So does Think Progress, along with more from Newt’s past. For more, see The Carpetbagger Report, PoliBlog, and DownWithTyranny!.)

I would conclude that he’s lost it, but I’m not so sure he had all that much to lose. I agree that some video games are violent and that young people should not have access to them, but it is ridiculous to claim that video games were behind this massacre. As well, it’s ridiculous to claim that atheism (or, rather, not believing in Newt’s God) or the absence of speech codes were behind it.

Let me address three points in particular:

1) Conservatives once argued, and occasionally still do argue, against speech codes on college campuses. Just to show what an unironic theocrat he has become, Newt is here arguing for speech codes, for restrictions on freedom. (As he has before. Apparently the First Amendment means so little to him that he is more than willing to defecate all over it.)

2) Conservatives once argued, or claimed that they argued (for it’s all mostly spin-happy rhetoric), for personal responsibility — a culture thereof, in fact. (Remember Bush in 2000? Remember how Clinton was held up as a model of personal irresponsibility?) They ridiculed liberals for suggesting that crime was social, not just personal and moral. But here we have Newt suggesting that the culture is to blame for what happened at Virginia Tech.

3) Apparently, according to Newt, there was no such violence and no such crime before liberalism, that it’s all a strictly liberal phenomenon. And, too, according to Newt, there is apparently no such violence and no such crime where Christianity, or at least Newt’s version of it, is strong. Consider that Newt is a history teacher. Consider how little Newt seems to know about history. I needn’t mention what was going on in the world before liberalism and when Christianity was the faith of choice and/or coercion.

Newt may have lost his mind, but he is dangerous because many people still, for whatever reason, seem to pay attention to him. And many on the right obviously share his view that liberalism is to blame for all of society’s ills.

If liberalism can be blamed for anything it is for allowing Newt and his simple-minded ilk to speak freely in a free and democratic country. But that, we liberals argue, is what liberalism is all about: freedom. Newt doesn’t get that, but it’s good that he is free to make such an ass of himself and that we are free to call him on it.

Let’s blame feminism.

He truly deserves this award. But, then, it hasn’t been the first time. The scary thing is that there are many who think the comment in the link is the kind of “discussion” that comprises politic debate. No. It is an attempt to whip up hatred against people who happen to disagree with you on other issues. By comparison, he makes Newt Gingrich’s related earlier comments seem like a thoughtful PhD dissertation.

Last Thursday, a “Service of Remembrance and Reflection for Victims of Virginia Technical Institute and State University Tragedy” was held at Cornell University’s Sage Chapel. Cornell’s President delivered the following address:

We Are One.

We are one; one community, one people, one planet.

We are here today to affirm that one-ness and to draw strength from each other, to find peace in each other, to care for each other and to share our love.

We are one.

We are here to bear witness to the passing of the 33 members of our family at Virginia Tech University who have met an untimely and terrible fate.

We are here for all of those who are gone, for all 33.

We are here for the 32 who have passed from the immediate to another place, not by their own choice.

We are also here for the 1 who has also passed.

We are one.

Hat-tip: normblog

Arcadio Esquivel, Cagle Cartoons, La Prensa, Panama

Anyone can overstay their welcome — particularly a swarming news media during a major, history-making, terrible event. And so it goes at Virginia Tech too:

You’ve seen the news coverage from Blacksburg, complete with prominent network anchors reporting from the scene.

And now, the student government at Virginia Tech is asking for all of that to end. It’s calling on hundreds of reporters to leave campus by Monday morning, when students are supposed to return to classes.

A spokeswoman for the student government says the campus appreciates the reporting on the story, but that students are ready to move forward.

Liz Hart says “The best way to know how to do that is get the campus back to normal.”

She says students need to be able to get back to class and back into a “normal routine as much as possible” without any reminders of what a “difficult road” it will be.

In her words … “We already know it.

And, indeed, there is a point in any news story where it ebbs and flows. In media editor terms, this one is still ongoing. But to those who have suffered a trauma from which they realistically will never really recover — life goes on but memories remain — a news media on campus trying to find the new twist or someone who hasn’t been asked yet “how do you feel?” is not a welcome one.

The subsidiary story will now be how many news organizations agree to this request. Most likely: not many and not everyone. A news story often has a life of its own and it’s seldom dictated by whether the subjects, players or bystanders important to the story want it to end or not. It has more to do with what other news organizations are doing.

Does it look like the New York Times is still reporting on the campus? Is the Washington Post doing interviews with campus officials or students? Is CNN or Fox News doing pieces from the scene? If so, others will want to be there, too…to find their new twist on the story. Stories, particularly tragedies, take on lives of their own.

The AP notes that students and educators want to try to salvage the rest of the year:

When classes resume Monday, the university will give students three choices: They can continue their studies through the end of the semester next week, take a grade based on what they have done so far, or withdraw from a course without penalty….

….Students interviewed by The Associated Press on campus in recent days say they and everyone they know intends to return.

“This is the best school around,” said Steven Mason, a senior from Appomattox. “As far I’m concerned, they did everything they could.”

Said Cheryl Gambardella, Brittany Gambardella’s mother, as she helped her daughter unload the car: “We love this school. You always have concerns, but not because it’s Virginia Tech. It could happen in a shopping mall.”

So there is a feeling that life — even one traumatized by a recent shocking event — needs to go on.

Which is harder to accomplish if someone is there with a notebook or microphone asking you “how do you feel”…

Those who are not wedded to demonizing “the other side” at all costs KNEW this would happen. We just had to figure out who it would come from. Jerry Falwell? Pat Robertson? Rush Limbaugh?

Well, no, it came from former House Speaker and apparent GOP Presidential wannabe Newt Gingrich.

Do you know what the REAL cause of the Virginia Tech Massacre was? It was liberalism …. according to Gingrich.

Read it and watch the video HERE.

Isn’t it time for THINKING Americans to totally filter out, not listen to and not read people who can’t let even seven days go by before turning a barbaric outrage into a political vehicle to try and use against the other side?

In recent years this writer had begun to respect Newt Gingrich for his often unpredictable and independent comments on events. But now it has come time to skip over any news story about him, any columns written by him and not waste time doing posts on anything involving him. His credibility is zilch unless it comes to believing that he lives in a condo on the moon. If Mr. Gingrich does get the nomination (which seems as likely as water skiing on the sun) the Democrats should rejoice since his share of independent voters will be about as high as Vice President Dick Cheney’s popularity rating. If that much.

Yes, Newt. This is REALLY the way to heal Americans after a mass murder: say it’s due to one political ideology in America (and the way you define it).

Should the blogosphere declare 30 April to be a Day of Silence “to remember the victims of the Virginia Tech massacre and to stand united with the families”?

Lisa Sabin says no: silence is part of the problem. Tim Worstall describes it as “a silly idea.”

I think that the ones who took the initiative mean well, but I think it would be wiser to wait a while and use a day, say, in August or September. We should, then, not just remember those who died at VA Tech, but those who died everywhere, due to war, terrorism, crazy people, etc. An international day of mourning and rememberance.

Those Terrible Virginia Tech Cartoons

By Daryl Cagle

When a lunatic killed 32 people at Virginia Tech University earlier this week I knew what to expect from political cartoonists, who don’t react well to tragedy. Some of the cartoons seemed insensitive, as today’s generation of jokesters struggled to respond to a story with no lighter side.

I have some sympathy for the editorial cartoonists who have a daily deadline and must respond to the headline of the day. The first cartoons were predictable: Uncle Sam or the Virginia Tech mascot, with bowed heads and flags or the school pennant at half-mast. There were lots of riffs on the school logo (the letters “VT�), including one depicting the school logo in dead bodies. Some cartoonists launched immediately into gun control cartoons – “how terrible it is that guns are so widely available� and “what a shame it is that none of the victims were toting firearms to protect themselves.�

I run a syndicate that distributes editorial cartoons to newspapers, and our editors were not happy. The day after the tragedy one editor from Georgia wrote: “As a Cagle subscriber, I have to tell you the cartoons sent today about the Virginia Tech shootings showed a deplorable lack of sensitivity and taste. Can’t you find (someone) who isn’t so quick to try to be funny or cute at innocent people’s expense?â€?

As bad as this week was for cartoonists, it was worse for television. An army of aggressive TV reporters descended on little Blacksburg, Va., asking everyone they could find, “How do you feel?â€? and “Did you know him?â€? The television coverage reached new heights of ugliness when NBC released the killer’s “Multimedia Manifestoâ€? and all we could see on cable news was 24 hours of “non-stop nut-case.â€? It took a day for the wallpaper killer coverage to devolve into finger pointing among the media about whether they were doing the right thing in publicizing the killer’s message. Read the rest of this entry »

Daryl Cagle, MSNBC.com