Shooting at Va. Tech

Two interesting stories I've seen in the past few hours...

1) A Newsweek article suggesting the guns were not purchased legally afterall, despite what police claim. What a surprise.

2) A CNN report from South Korea where Cho's extended family was interviewed. Apparently he did not speak as a child, either. An aunt remembered an 8-year-old boy who clearly was not right. He obviously had a speech problem, (perhaps an apraxia?) and who knows what else. It sounds like the family was living in a basement in South Korea, so they couldn't afford therapy or child developmental specialists.

 

So how about addressing the problem of illegal gun purchases? Furthermore, there's far too many loopholes in an net gun purchase than one at your local pawn dealer.

Here's another thing: poor people suffer. Rich people kill and have a hell of a chance of getting off the hook. They sure won't face the ultimate penalty.

 

-- I think Fairfax County was the worst place the kid could have wound up, what with the sharp socioeconomic divide that exists there.

-- I don't see the speech impediment that has been reported, at least not in the videos.

-- Not enough about the Asian failure complex, well-documented and very real, has been investigated. While Tech is a fine school, the guy's sister went to Princeton and I can't imagine that was a good thing for him.

 

I'm thinking more of a developmental delay than an impediment per say. Let's say you have a language delay as a child that goes unchecked. Perhaps you "catch up" somewhat by the time you're a teenager... That still doesn't make up for not being able to communicate all those years.

I'm by no means making excuses for the kid, God no, but the science person in me does want to know what happened to his brain.

 

Reading the stories about how he was treated by classmates in junior high and high school makes me think that the education system has to make a serious, serious push to stop the mean-spiritedness that goes on in adolescence. No one should have to go through that. I can see where it definitely sends someone on a path like this. Getting teased at that age can be scarring. And it's a fucking jungle for those kids. Everyone just trying to keep from being the target.

I know it's what happens at that age, but it seems like compassion and kindness is something that can be instilled from a very, very early age. Taught right along with reading and writing.

 

OK, I was the first to criticize the Richmond Times-Dispatch for a crappy job on their online product in the days following this tragic event. Their Web site, in my eyes, failed to express the severity of one of the biggest stories in the state's history.

I'm a firm believer that in this high-tech charged world we live in, online is our future and it just irks me when big papers, papers that are in the state's capital no less, fail to grasp this concept.

Now, I want to be the first to say, finally, timesdispatch.com is doing what's right and doing a damn fine job. As a reader, when I go to that site now, there's no doubt the paper understands its critical role in being the "hometown hub" for dispersal of news from Blacksburg.

Thanks for listening. And keep up the good work RTD.

 

Kid picks on another kid. Teacher sees kid pick on another kid. Teacher doesnt discipline kid for fear that kid will go home and tell Mommy and Daddy. Mommy and Daddy then show up at school demandind the teacher be fired because how DARE they critcize my Johnny. He's a fucking angel, a saint. He cleans out the garage with his dad and mows the grass once a year. Where the hell does this teacher gets off, and why is she picking on my child. Kids pick on kids all of the time, why is my child being singled out. I want that teacher to apologize to my child.

I long for the good old days when a parent teacher conference meant the teacher told your parents how much of a fuck off you were and then your parents came home and ripped your ass. It was the only time in my life when just the sound of the garage door shot me into a white panic. Now, no one says shit because the parents live in this dilusional world where their child does no wrong and the education system does no right.

I have friends that taught in COLLEGE and were getting calls from parents saying "You're being too tough on these kids. You give out too much home work." Yo dad, get back to banging your secretary and leave the education to the professionals.

 

The first problem here, Knute, is most of that teasing and taunting goes on out of view of any teacher.

And as I mentioned elsewhere, going down the teasing/bullying angle on this incident is just too massive a stretch in my view. Millions and millions of kids have been teased and taunted in their adolescent years, including probably everyone on this board (ok, a few 'effin studs and studettes excluded). Somehow, 99.99999999999% manage to deal with it without becoming a mass murderer.

 

A-fucking-men BYM.

 

The only thing I've seen regarding the gun purchase is that he shouldn't have been allowed to purchase a gun due to the fact a judge found him to be, I don't remember the term but let's call it, mentally unbalanced. That alone is enough to stop the sale.

However, that ruling never showed up in the background check. Why? Because there is no mechanism for the court to inform the state so it WOULD show up on the background check.

So while he never should have been allowed to purchase either gun, nobody's at fault because everybody followed the rules.

Unfuckingbelievable.

 

Thank you.
In this business, we're often overly critical of our own work. We second guess ourselves endlessly.
I was very pleased with our product today.
Our cover, for those interested:

http://media.gatewayva.com/rtd/pdfs/vt-tribute_page1.pdf

 

Amen.