I didn’t care until this afternoon when I heard a mention on NPR of a young woman who was raped and murdered more than a decade ago at my alma mater’s rival school–Lehigh University. For some reason, hearing that incident mentioned swooped me back in time to when I was a freshman in college, and we got new electronic locks on the doors, and when people whined that the new locks would make it more difficult for their friends to visit them, they were told that Lehigh never unlocks the doors of their dorms, even during the daytime, because of a case where a student was . . .(see first sentence).
Although in fairness, just listening to people on NPR talk about this incident makes it a lot more real, anyway, regardless of that close encounter with my past.
But it’s funny how people’s deaths affect other people sometimes. There was a man I sort of knew who I think killed himself a month ago. If he were alive, I’d have hardly given him a thought–probably. If he’d died of illness or fatal car accident, I’d have mourned briefly and moved on. But because I suspect he committed suicide, I dwell on it. I’ll probably never know for certain, and that’s ok, because this man’s life and death are not that entwined with my life.
And like (almost) everyone else, I care more about those whose lives are intertwined with mine, or those where I think “There, but for the Grace of God go I”.
I think they do. I think that’s the whole point here. People are saying they feel more sad about this.
And I still don’t get the “expectation” thing. To me, horrific violence that’s expected is worse to me than horrific violence that’s unexpected. To me, the systematic slaughter of six million Jews by the Nazis is more sad than six million murders committed in the heat of passion or by insane people.
I guess I’m unusual, but being unexpected doesn’t give a tragedy special status for me.
Another thing that always puzzles me is when they say, “She/he had a family”, as though it’s somehow less sad when single people die.
You’re speaking in general terms about death. Sure, death sucks most of the time, but I find it hard to believe that you would feel the same way about my death as you would about your own mother’s. We have emotional attachments that make some deaths more painful than others.
Or when they have a piece on the news where “… one of that people who died was going to be an astronaut…” What if they were going to be a crack whore? Is their death any less tragic?
Who said anything about my mother? Like I said, I don’t feel any more emotional attachment to total strangers just because they happen to have been born in the same country as I was. So I feel the same sadness for innocent people who die in Iraq as I do for innocent people who die in Virginia. Based only on the country in which they reside, I feel neither more nor less emotionally attached to them. Apparently that’s not the case for other people, and that’s where we differ, I guess. Obviously, if I knew someone, I would be much more sad if they died, but that’s not what we’re talking about.
It bothers me because I have spent nearly all of my adult working life on campus (and as a faculty kid, who then went on to college and grad degrees, a lot of my pre-working life, too).
I tend to have a more distanced reaction to violence that happens far from me, to people whose lives and livelihoods seem different from mine. I’m not necessarily proud of that, but I think it’s a adaptive method for dealing with those “What the fuck is the world coming to” feelings that Sampiro describes. It could be overwhleming if I had to deal with those feelings every time the media treated me to a story of tragedy and senseless violence. Therefore, I don’t think about it a lot.
However, campus violence hits me differently. This violence happened at a place I think of a somewhat sacred and apart–a college campus. It’s where young people can get riled up over ideas and philosophies. Where they rally about the causes of the day, and rail against the “oppression” of the drop/add policy. It’s an enclave, and it’s supposed to be a safe place, even as I understand that’s a very naive view. I remember the heated debates around here when our campus police wanted to begin to carry firearms. People freaked, I think as much as anything because it violated their image of what an “unreal” and “apart” place campus should be. That view persists, I think.
Also, it’s kinship. Those are my colleagues, both among the victims and among the survivors, including those who have to deal with the aftermath. Those are just like the people I walk by every day. I imagine someone who works at an auto factory feels it more in the gut when a shooting happens in an assembly plant. Tellers are more upset when they hear of an armed bank robbery.
He would have experienced shame and relative deprivation for an extended period of time.
He also might have experienced smugness and pride, whcih would have been bad IMHO.
No matter what, there is no where for the victims/survivors/family to focus their rage, so it may harm the grieving process and cause people to become stagnated in the anger stage (looking desperately for someone to blame and see “justice” done).
In effect, you are right, he paid the “ultimate” price. But, retribution is not necessarily paying the “ultimate” price. A lot of it has to do with answering questions, even if they are meaningless, such as “why”. One of the most over-asked questions that, no matter what answer is given, it doesn’t make anything any better, but people still want to know.
I think he’s so far off the beam that he wasn’t feeling anything except crazy. He was writing such weird and depraved things that his teacher turned his work into her supervisors, and eventually decided to teach him one-on-one. This guy doesn’t sound willing or capable of answering questions.
I care because it’s an awful event, and I tend to emphasise, by nature, I suppose. I can always imagine the person hurting’s emotions, and my mind stretches to understand their hurt. In real life, I try to figure out how to make it better for those in my periphery. Mebbe it’s a Female Thang.
Today, my “weekend”, by work parameters, I watched the midday convoction at VA Tech, and was moved to tears by that ceremony. I don’t have any connection to that college, by cried as that community voiced their shock and hurt. I cried because they were hurting, and was moved so, as a human being moved by great loss, beyond understanding. I was moved by that community coming together, having people from many faiths speak out, and recognizing that it’s that community that sustains us through inexplicable loss. We can’t understand that, but can do the best effort of support to others.
And, I really found my good heart self thinking about the gunman’s family. They are probably the lonliest people in the world today. I have no idea of their partiiculars; but, I have prayers for them, as well.
Yes, I’m frustrated that he was not taken alive. I wish he could have done a perp walk. I wish he could have indicted himself under questioning. I wish he would have to live with the knowledge that someone else was going to cause his death, by needle, gas or whatever the DP method is in VA. He doesn’t have to face any consequences he didn’t plan for, and his victims did not have that choice.
And elelle, I was thinking the same thing about his family. No matter what happens, he’s still their son, and I imagine they’re grieving twice. Even if he were alive right now, he still would not be the person they once knew. I can’t help wondering how long ago he went off the rails, if they tried to get help for him, and if they ever feared it would come to this. They’ve lost someone too, and I hope no one is taking this out on them.
One of the victims, a professor, was a Holocaust survivor.
I guess it depends on what you mean by “more sad.” Part of being effected by something like this is the shock involved. Any war is sad and a horrible thing. The Iraq war is a tragedy. But I don’t get shocked or moved on a daily basis by events there. Sure, every now and then something happens that reinforces my anger that we’re there, but it’s not as shocking. I’m more bothered by those things on a intellectual level than on an emotional level. Unexpected things hit more on the emotional level.
The only thing I can compare it to is an injury I had a few years ago. I had some pain killers, but I didn’t like the way they upset my stomach. So I suffered along, going through my life. The pain was around, but it was in the back of my mind for the most part. Then I lost a filling. The toothache was much less painful than the injury, but it was new and unexpected. As such, it bothered me much worse than the injury pain that I’d learned to deal with. I was tempted to start taking the painkillers for the stupid toothache (I didn’t) when I was fine dealing with the worse pain of my injury.
Who said they feel more sorry for American dead than Iraqui dead purely for nationalistic reasons? People can have all sorts of reasons they feel bad for the people in Virginia. Maybe their dad went to the school. Maybe they used to live there. Maybe they knew someone whose kid was enrolled there. I haven’t heard anyone say they didn’t feel bad about the dead civilians in Iraq. I think it’s natural to have emotional attachments to places that are familiar or have some other connection. I certainly don’t see anything wrong with mourning dead people, regardless of the reason.
In addition to what Kalhoun said, I think one of the possible reasons that here versus there affects so many people is because the circumstances obviously feel different. As an example, the poor citizens of Iraq live in a shitstorm every day that they can’t help. No amount of anything can hardly make them safer (besides relocating) and most are probably somewhat prepared for what they might see as virtually unavoidable. Either to them personally or family, friends, acquaintances or merely by association. When you have bombs going off everywhere, I’m sure your fate seems quite the opposite of others who live in unoccupied territories and aren’t at war.
However, for us here in the states, we don’t have to consider such things daily. Our main focus is getting through the repetitions of life. So unfortunately, we’re caught completely off guard when tragedy hits. I suppose so if it’s right next door, the school you used to attend, the friend of a friend or your daughter’s, anything that could be construed of you (theoretically) barely having escaped alive. In other words, out of the clear blue, you’re not pondering that your elderly mum could be gunned down in her tiny hometown grocer’s in BFE America. And can you imagine trying to keep that at the fore of your mind constantly?? I’m assuming it just couldn’t be done and so, this sort of insanity throws us all for a fucking loop.
We are horrified at what evil befalls anyone, no matter where they live. Regardless though, if Dahmer had been your next door neighbor, I’m sure that would carry a little more impact and thought-provocation then reading about a suicide bomber killing one in a place you may not even know where is. Does any of that make sense?
I’ve made a comment akin to this before but I’ll repeat it here: I feel worse when Americans die senseless, violent deaths than I do when people in other countries do. Period.
The killing of 33 students yesterday moved me and made me feel terrible. I did not cry. When my mother died at 71 after a lifetime of smoking and ignoring numerous wake-up calls about her smoking, I cried and was in full blown mourning. This is not saying that I feel the life of a 71 year old retired smoker is worth more than that of 33 college age students and professors who died with them- intellectually I know it isn’t. But I’ll go one further: if one of my dogs had died yesterday, I’d have been far more depressed and upset, and it certainly isn’t because I feel my dog’s life has more merit than the lives of 33 college age students and professors. It’s because the death of my mother affected and the death of my dog would affect me directly, immediately, it leaves an absence in my life.
Intellectually I know that the deaths of however many tens of thousands of Iraqis are more tragic than the deaths of 33 Americans. Emotionally, I don’t feel them like I do those of the Americans. They’re too far outside of my concentric circles, plus emotions are not governed by logic (even for Vulcans). It’s not about race (as I said, if the shooting had been of black students at a predominantly black college it would have affected me far more than the death of 33 white students in Prague) but about familiarity and the ability to translate the abstract into a somehow more tangible concept. I don’t apologize for it.
And I somehow doubt I or Americans in general are unique in this. Anyone else remember the cheering crowds shown in Muslim countries on 9-11?
For what it’s worth, the shootings didn’t emotionally affect me until I heard about the 70 year old holocaust survivor who lost his life protecting his students. If that doesn’t make you lose faith in the universe, nothing will.
I think a university president will get fired for no good reason. The fact that there was a killing involving 2 people at the other end of the campus does not mean a mass murderer is on the loose. Usually killers make a run for it. To assume that this was a danger to the other students would have been a huge stretch. Also the students were on their way to school and many unreachable. But someone has to take the blame…
