Good piece, and good points about the media. I am really sick of them being in my town. I was just at a memorial on the drillfield, and the VT baseball team came to pay their respects, and I heard some media people say "here comes the baseball team, that'll be a great shot, blah blah blah". And it could've bene a beautiful moment if they weren't all up in their faces.
This does bring up issues that need discussing regarding mental health, xenophobia, gun control, etc., but we need to grieve first.

Nice article, Samhita.

That is an excellent article and I love how you pointed out the 183 people killed that barely received a message.

I had 3 classes today and every class focused around this issue. One girl in my class's younger brother is Korean and is also shy and introverted. She said he has already received comments from individual's at work about whether or not he "will shoot them up."

I agree that the focus of the media attention is horrible and they seem to ignore the major issues about this catastrophe. America as a whole will forget about this but for the student's at VT it will remain at the fore front in their mind. Imagine having to have class in that building again or just the stress of returning to the campus next fall.

One thing we discussed was how news stations described Cho's video as "revictimizing the families of the victims" right before they aired it for everyone to see.

America as a whole will forget about this but for the student's at VT it will remain at the fore front in their mind. Imagine having to have class in that building again or just the stress of returning to the campus next fall.

I agree. I can't imagine what it would have to be like to walk into that building again, knowing how many people died there, and have to take notes, etc., like it's any other classroom. I imagine that students/faculty at Columbine High School (whose tragedy's anniversary is today) have/had to go through the same thing.

Thanks, Samhita, for posting the link. I wouldn't seen it to read otherwise.

I too, felt conflicted about the wall-to-wall news coverage, even as the grinding violence in Iraq (and in other places all around the world) continues as sound-bite stories. I believe that every murder victim, whether in a insane shooting or on the streets of a war-torn city, deserves that moment of silence and respect. But speaking up about this, I find, makes people think I am callous about the VT deaths. I don't mean to be saying, "what do they have to complain about?" . . . but that's what they hear. And in a way, I realize they are right: I am challenging our right to treat some (domestic) violence with more attention than other (international) violence. I am trying to raise awareness that, rather than some intrusion on "normality," such levels of violence are the stuff of everyday existence in some parts of the world.

It is a very, very hard line to walk. I'm sure I don't always get it right.

Great article. Minor quibble...Oakland is in Alameda County. My wife teaches in "deep east" Oakland. They had four murders in the neighborhood this semester.

stephen,
absolutely. these darned kids in sf completely forget about the east bay, even when they started off their cali days off of san pablo.

dang, i'm in nyc and i still remember why they call it AC transit.

that said, great article, sami. i absolutely love watching your writing grow and mature. really thoughtful, measured and clear.

There are some things that I respectfully disagree about.

"From the immediate release that he is an Asian man (they never say the White man, do they?) ..."

Ever read the profile of a serial or rampage killer? They all start: white male age 20-40. The fact that this person is outside of that profile would seem to be newsworthy.

"Salon's Joe Eaton talks about how this can be compared to 9/11 since Asians started fleeing the campus immediately with fear of backlash and along the same lines Andrew Lam takes on the "please let it be another Asian," mentality that hits the people when our obsession with finding the perpetrator takes over and the hate crimes it motivates."

I would argue that the Middle Eastern backlash just after 9/11 was few and far between (yes, a few nutjobs did some stupid things) and that the Asian backlash for this shooting has been nonexistant. Any American with half a brain knows that one person committed these shootings and that it was not perpetrated by his ancestry and his upbringing. On 9/11, a coworker of mine stopped by her Muslim friend's house for a couple hours. A number of friends stopped by that house that day just to make sure that no idiot did something stupid. Give the people of this country some credit, the way we view the people around us has come a long way even in just the past few decades.

"Why does America only care about certain people's death?"

I would argue that this became very newsworthy because this was all orchestrated and committed by one person.

"The United States is guilty by setting a precedent of violence, historically and today. There is a connection between our unjust invasion of Iraq with these examples of violence. If we don't accept that, we won't be able to prevent these things from happening in the future."

Ok, call me ignorant but you lost me there. Could you explain this further, please?

dave,

a couple of your points... first, regarding the point about serial killers being assumed to be white. sure. however, while most people picked up on street-level drug charges are people of color, race is almost always mentioned in news media reports, whereas serial killers rarely have their whiteness specified (though it does happen time-to-time).

further, regarding the post-911 backlash and similar issues. if there were not a threat, why would you and your friends find it necessary to provide ad-hoc security for your colleague?

mind you, sami was refering to "fear of backlash", which your story supports. where's the disagreement?

as far as the backlash itself, according to raw data gathered under the HCSA, violence against muslims jumped from 28 reported incidents in 2000 to 481 in 2001.

you can check the numbers here.

more some other time - now, sleep.

heights and blessings

oh, yeah, and saying that we've still got a long way to go is not to discredit all the progress we've made, as a people and a nation.

i mean, shoot, i'm sure sharecropping is a better situation than out-and-out slavery, but it sure ain't any good.

the Asian backlash for this shooting has been nonexistant --Dave

Thank goddess.

Dave, the US was built on violence. The NA genocide, Manifest Destiny, slavery, stealing the SW from Mexico though violent warfare, the history of the 2nd amendment to kill British, the invention of the reloadable gun, the KKK and NRA to ward of the fear of blacks and to kill them, multitudes of neo-imperialist invasions and interventions mostly for profit. The media kept saying it was the biggest shooting in US history when the biggest shooting in history was the Masscre at Wounded Knee which killed 300 Lakota and Sioux Indians in 1890. That's violent along with everything I mentionned, wouldn't you say?

"mind you, sami was refering to "fear of backlash", which your story supports. where's the disagreement?"

I guess we get differing conclusions from that story. What I got from that is how Americans stick up for other Americans. No backlash was even attempted at that house. Friends of hers stopped by in groups of one or two just in case. I don't expect someone to come barging into my house tonight, but I still locked the door.

As far as general backlash, as I said, some idiots did some stupid things just after 9/11. We all deal with grief from horrifying events in different ways. Some people deal with it in healty ways, some not. I could name you some countries that I have been in where just being an American is dangerous.

"... whereas serial killers rarely have their whiteness specified (though it does happen time-to-time)."

I guess I just always assume that a serial killer is white unless otherwise specified.

"i mean, shoot, i'm sure sharecropping is a better situation than out-and-out slavery, but it sure ain't any good."

Solid and permanent change does not happen overnight. The ways in which people view the world around them changes in small steps.

"Dave, the US was built on violence."

Donna, the WORLD was built on violence. All the great ancient civilizations became great by conquering those around them. I do hope you are not saying that the US had it coming, that the US deserves shootings like this. Please tell me that's not the case.

You're right about that.

I think 4-16 happened because of paranoid schizophrenia, lack of mental health care, the immigrant experience, poverty and racism in that order.

You can't discount the cultural backdrop of violence. The world was built on violence but the US as experienced by this young man was also violent. Look at what Bush is doing. Americans spoke against him during the midterm elections and 70% are against this war but he is a lone madman also who happens to be out leader. Look at the backdrop of last half century.

I guess I just always assume that a serial killer is white unless otherwise specified.

Well Dave, I think that's probably your own issue, so I hope that you're conceeding the point.

I would like to say, though, that I think the media EXPECTS us to assume that a person is white unless otherwise specified. That's really a problem in greater society. I can't tell yout he number of people I know who will tell a story and specify that someone is a "black guy" and yet feel no need to point out that everyone else in the story is a "white guy." Also, when we "forget" to say the race of a perp when he is white (if it's a woman, it's a whole other media extravaganza) and yet so frequently naming the perps race when he's not it normalizes this (often false) notion that a "majority" of all crimes are committed by non-whites. It sets us up to expect that kind of violence from some people and yet ignore it in others and enforce racial stereotypes while doing nothing more than "stating the facts."

Hmm. A little of both, I think. I don't think it's Dave's issue--I believe that almost all serial killers in this country have been white. This particular killer was a spree killer, not a serial killer, as I understand it, but almost all of them have been white too.

What I find interesting is that when it comes to school shootings, high school or college, until this one, they have all been carried out by white boys (oh, except that one in Scotland who inspired the Boomtown Rats song--she was a girl). In the US, though, all white boys. The fact that the media has consistently ignored the role that gender and race play in this kind of violence, because the killers have been of the "normal," and thus invisible, race and gender is pretty appalling.

But now that an Asian-American man did the same thing, Asians have to fear backlash.

More from Bowling For Columbine...

Marilyn Manson: The two by-products of that whole tragedy, violence in entertainment, and gun control. And how perfect that that was the two things that we were going to talk about with the upcoming election. And also, then we forgot about Monica Lewinsky and we forgot about, uh, the President was shooting bombs overseas, yet I'm a bad guy because I, well I sing some rock-and-roll songs, and who's a bigger influence, the President or Marilyn Manson? I'd like to think me, but I'm going to go with the President.

Michael Moore: Do you know that on the day of the Columbine massacre, the US dropped more bombs on Kosovo than any other day?

Marilyn Manson: I do know that, and I think that's really ironic, that nobody said 'well maybe the President had an influence on this violent behavior' Because that's not the way the media wants to take it and spin it, and turn it into fear, because then you're watching television, you're watching the news, you're being pumped full of fear, there's floods, there's AIDS, there's murder, cut to commercial, buy the Acura, buy the Colgate, if you have bad breath they're not going to talk to you, if you have pimples, the girl's not going to fuck you, and it's just this campaign of fear, and consumption, and that's what I think it's all based on, the whole idea of 'keep everyone afraid, and they'll consume.'

Michael Moore: If you were to talk directly to the kids at Columbine or the people in that community, what would you say to them if they were here right now?

Marilyn Manson: I wouldn't say a single word to them, I would listen to what they have to say and that's what no one did.