In October 1997, I heard on the radio that Luke Woodham, a sixteenyear-old, had killed two classmates and wounded seven others in a school shooting in Pearl, Mississippi. In a note, Luke declared: “I am not insane. I am angry. I killed because people like me are mistreated every day.”1 He explained that he was tired of being called a “faggot”; he was additionally enraged that his girlfriend—whom he killed in the shooting—had broken up with him. At the start of the Woodham case, I began examining school shootings. Two months after the massacre in Mississippi came a shooting in Kentucky, then one in Arkansas that same month, and then another in Arkansas three months later in March 1998. There was a shooting in Pennsylvania that April, in Tennessee…
Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold murdered their classmates and teacher at Columbine High School on April 20, 1999. (Cullen“The Depressive and Psychopath”). Harris and Klebold have planned for a year about what they wereare going to do. They wanted to do the shooting on the same day as the Oklahoma City bombing (“Columbine High School Shooting”). Their hatred led them to seek revenge on the people at the school whomthat they both hated. In Harris’s journal, his opening sentence was “I hate the f---ing world” (Cullen“The Depressive and Psychopath”). In theirthere massacre they targetedaimed towards athletes but, when bombs went off they would gun down any and everything fleeing the school. It was just as much of a bombing as it was a shooting (“The…
However, someone like Seung-Hui Cho, the perpetrator of the Virginia Tech shootings, links more closely with Raifman’s model.3 From a young age, Cho was very quiet, rarely speaking, and continued to act this way even after he moved to the United States from Korea.4 However, no mental health issues were suspected, mainly because his Korean culture tended to taboo mental health, causing family members to blame his silence on something else, like the fact that he was only studying a lot.4 This ignorance continued until eighth grade when he was formally diagnosed with selective mutism and social anxiety.3 He started treatment in high school and got better, but suddenly decided to stop treatment altogether, causing a setback in his mental health.4 Since federal law prohibits disclosing personal information without Cho’s permission, Virginia Tech University did not receive any information of past mental disorders;4 this directly marks one of the steps in Raifman’s model, as there was a clear reversal of mental health due to avoided intervention without accountability.2 His experience in college only exacerbated this as his writing, social interactions, and romantic endeavors were constantly rejected;4 concerns from peers led him to spend time at a mental health center before returning back to Virginia Tech for his senior year.3 Not long after, Cho legally purchased multiple guns and began practicing at shooting ranges.4 This extensive planning highlights another aspect of…
“It is a very tragic day for us in virginia. My reaction was just shock. My first thought was just how tragic this was for the university” - Virginia Gov. Timothy M. Kaine. It was tragic day for the friends and families of the victims. Virginia tech massacre is a tragic event that in history and has impacted many people.…
April 20, 1999, Littleton, Colorado, Columbine High School, thirteen killed. August 1, 1966, Austin, Texas, University of Texas, fourteen killed. December 14, 2012, Newtown, Connecticut, Sandy Hook Elementary, twentysix killed. April 16, 2007, Blacksburg, Virginia, Virginia Tech, thirtythree killed. May 18, 1927, Bath Township, Michigan, Bath High School, fortyfive…
It has been thought that those who would commit such horrendous crimes would suffer from some sort of mental illness, however Granovetter’s model proves otherwise. In Malcolm Gladwell’s article “Thresholds of Violence” he uses the story of a young man named John LaDue, who was a quiet and loving kid that one day plotted to set off a bomb at his own high school. “I have good parents. I live in a good town,” says LaDue. He was never diagnosed with any type of mental illness and did not have typical symptoms of a school killer. Granovetter’s theory offers us an explanation as to why such a normal kid would commit to such a terrible act. The theory states that a person who normally wouldn’t do something belligerent, such as a rioter, is more likely to do it because they saw someone do the same thing first. Gladwell uses this theory to convince readers that this is why school shootings have become more common. “A riot was a social process, in which people did things in reaction to and in combination with those around them.” Granovetter claims that this theory could describe many different situations such as strikes, elections, and even leaving a…
During the spring of 2007 on the Virginia Polytech Institute campus, a student named Seung-Hui Cho had shot 2 students in a resident hall before entering classrooms and shooting 32 other students and professors (Glum). This event had created a call for necessities in protecting not only the Virginia Tech school but all large campuses in America. Director of Virginia’s 32 National Campus Safety Initiative S. Daniel Carter stated, “That one incident sort of crystallized campus safety in people’s minds as a very, very serious issue.” (Glum). The school itself had warning signs before the incident that also brought into questions how the situation could’ve been different and how potentional threats need be…
"You had a hundred billion chances and ways to have avoided today, "But you decided to spill my blood." You forced me into a corner and gave me only one option. The decision was yours. Now you have blood on your hands that will never wash off." This were the words of," Cho Seung-Hui, 23 on April 16 2006.…
The lives of many were to change on the day of April 20th, 1999, at Columbine High School. With the death of twelve students and one teacher, it was to be the deadliest mass murder committed on an American high school campus. The massacre, committed by senior students Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, sparked debate over gun control laws; whether the availability of guns across the United States, especially to young people such as these, was socially acceptable. This event is what sparked Moore to create his documentary, ‘Bowling for Columbine’.…
In April 2007, a mass shooting at Virginia Tech occurred. At the time, it was considered the deadliest school shooting in American history. The shooter, Seung-Hui Cho, opened fire into classrooms that morning, killing 32 before taking his own life (Virginia Tech Review Panel, 2007). Sadly, this tragedy is just one incident in a string of many mass shootings in the United States. That is why taking steps to prevent these kinds of shootings is of utmost importance.…
The Virginia Tech massacre was an absolute disaster and could have been avoided if people actually did their jobs and what they were supposed to do leading up to and before the shootings began. Cho was spiraling well before the events and had he been reported to the police he never would have gotten his hands on two guns and all that ammunition. The Virginia Tech staff also dropped the ball because once they found the chained doors with the note that said there was a bomb, the person went up to the third floor to speak to a supervisor instead of just calling the police like they were supposed to. One if I saw chained doors and a note saying don’t leave or a bomb will go off I would immediately call the police. Then I would hop out of a window.…
Hey you think Dylan’s and Eric’s parents go in jail for what the kids did? The columbine shooting happened at the high school where they all went to school. The parents of the two boys should go to jail because they did nothing to stop them.…
Yes, Hazzard is effective for his audience because he is showing the truth about how the paramedics.…
It was Tuesday, April 20, 1999. It was an exciting day for me in the fourth grade when I turned 9 years old. However, the people of Littleton, Colorado remember that day as something more and definitely less exciting than my birthday was. On April 20, 1999 Littleton Colorado experienced what we now know as the Columbine Massacre. Two seniors at Columbine High School, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold completed this act killing 12 students, 1 teacher, and injured 21 others before committing suicide. Why would anyone want to commit such a horrific crime? Today I am going to talk to you about the boys and their preparations, the massacre itself, and the aftermath.…
She also took in consideration 22 year old Jared Loughner who in 2011, shooting of Congress woman Gabriel Gliffords, which took place in Arizona and killing 6 people as well as injuring 13 individuals. Even though there might be a correlation between these shootings I find that school shootings differ from the last two examples that involved individuals carrying out acts against individuals they did not know. Where as in the school shootings the shooters knew most of their victims and did not seem to suffer from a mental disorder. The article states that most involving individuals are not intimately known to the shooter , I disagree. In the shooting at Columbine High school, Virginia Tech and Columbine shooters Harris and Klebold whom meticulously planned their shooting of their high school a year in advance and definitely knew their 12 victims they killed May 1, 2001 at their high school. The article also brings up the importance of understanding the rampage killings in order to create preventive measures that are taking in the consideration of different situations, this I…