Implications

I decided I should probably write something about what happened at Virginia Tech. This is actually a cross post from something I wrote on my personal blog, so don’t fret about issues of authorship if you ever come across it somewhere else – it’s the same person. One thing that I would like to mention though, before I dive in, is that any mention to US ‘culture’ is not definitive – seriously, different suburbs are like different worlds in North America, so to judge the country as a whole is a dangerous area. However, there are some inherent differences between Australia that I will try to point out, but yes – I realise that there will be a million exceptions to every rule.

The shootings at Virginia Tech are undoubtedly tragic. I will admit that I cried – after seeing a picture on the news of the second person killed. It is said that he was trying to help the first victim as she was dying before he was gunned down. Then came the journalistic kicker – “He was a month away from graduating.”
What power – suddenly a point of commonality was offered up. Watching the news, it is very easy to forget the gravity of unnecessary death, pain and injustice. Every day there are reports of gruesome murders in the next suburb, suicide bombers in Iraq, rapists, paedophiles, et cetera. The worst part is that every day I feel less and less.

But there was something different about seeing his smiling photo, knowing he was a student and realising that we are the same – two young people hoping that our hard work will pay off, hoping their is a place for us in the world and looking forward to it. Then I realised that we were the same person, and now everything he had to look forward to and hope for has been cruelly snatched from him. It’s not fair, it’s unnecessary, and I am so angry and sad that this happened to him and the other victims.

However, there was a double-edged sword in this tragedy. The media has been quick to jump on the shooter, Cho Seung-Hui. In what seems to be some attempt to explain or even justify what happened, journalists have dug up testimonies and personal writings of his so as to paint him as a thoroughly ‘evil’ person. The public’s common logic will latch onto the idea, and process it as this: Evil person does evil things, fact of life. But there are some much more important issues at play here, relating to the ‘why’ and the ‘what now?’

What drove this man to commit this act? Apart from the ‘evil’ theory that seems to be saturating most mainstream press, there have been reports that he was delusional, psychotic and paranoid. It’s reasonable for one to argue that you would have to be to commit such acts, but the fact that somebody could get to such a point indicates a fatal flaw in mental health treatment and management programs. I’m not here to bash the US; mental health is an area that is greeted with doubt and a rather laissez-faire approach by most countries. But at some point we have to realise that contrary to what Tom Cruise may think, vitamins and sunshine do not a healthy mind make if there is a problem with brain chemistry.
Scientists have examined the brains of healthy individuals and compared them with patients affected with various mental health disorders, such as schizophrenia, anorexia, depression, bipolar, and others. What they found is that there are physical changes to the brain relating to the disorder – in some, parts of the brain have shrunken, in others there is decreased electromagnetic activity, others a lack of certain vital chemicals and hormones.
Medication is useful in treating mental health issues, especially when combined with things like cognitive therapy, behavioural therapy and counselling. Whatever school of thought you like, treatment of some kind is the best way to get better. But what happens to those who, like students, can’t afford treatment? Or people whose illnesses have isolated them and impaired their judgment to the point where they can’t seek it out for themselves?
The unfortunate thing is that mental health is not just a problem for governments and health professionals, it is a problem for everybody in every community. In news reports, teachers and classmates have stepped forward voicing their ‘fear’ of Cho Seung-Hui – telling how students felt afraid of him, how he wrote plays about his hatred of his classmates, stalked some female classmates and set fire to a dorm room. Teachers, classmates, family – did these people not feel it was their responsibility to make sure he got help? Reports are coming out that he was taking anti-depressants, meaning that he was seeing either a shrink or a doctor – how come this medical professional did not realise something dire was happening and take action? We can’t ask the governments for better mental health programs and resources if the people who really need them are not even going to use them, either because they think they don’t need them, or the people around them don’t care enough to make sure they get help.

The next issue that comes up is that of guns. I understand that it is a constitutional right of American people to possess a firearm for their protection, but this is clearly outdated – it’s not cowboys and Indians anymore. George W. Bush seemed eager to avoid the issue of gun control in his reaction to the issue, and I don’t blame him. If he were to say something along the lines of guns being only allowed for sporting, law enforcement and agricultural purposes, I’m sure some of his fellow Texans would personally come all the way up to the White House and shoot him (sorry Cherie). Guns are a far more accepted part of American culture than they are in many other countries, but at some point people have to realise that this is not necessarily a good thing. Having lethal weapons so easily available and so plentiful has potential for disaster, especially if the relative stability of the United States should ever dissolve into something like we are seeing in the Middle East. I sincerely hope that whoever gets voted in next time has the courage to reform gun laws, so that lives can be spared.

The last issue I’ll touch on is that of racial/cultural stereotyping. The shootings happened, then I found out that the shooter was Asian. Oh boy. I could just imagine what the popular public response would be – don’t tighten gun laws or address mental health infrastructure, let’s get rid of international students! Just as September 11 injected prejudice, fear and hatred worldwide and created new generations of Islamophobes, my concern is that the foreign origins of the shooter will encourage yet more malevolence. Cho Seung-Hui hailed from South Korea, but had lived in America since he was 8 years old. The Bush administration has targetted North Korea as the next ‘problem area’ after Iraq, and unfortunately many people don’t really understand the difference between North and South Korea. Will Cho Seung-Hui’s acts be taken as an act of hatred towards the ways of the West from ‘Korea’? Will he be unwittingly adopted as the poster-child of the enemy?

It is too soon to know what sort of implications are going rise from what just happened at Virginia Tech; whether the Bush administration will finally understand the consequences of the ‘gun culture’ they are so reluctant to reject, whether people will finally understand the severe consequences of their inaction and apathy towards mental illness in their communities, whether Cho Seung-Hui’s terrible acts will signal a more intense wave of hatred and misunderstanding. But we can know the gravity of what was lost on Monday – not just people’s lives, but all their hopes and optimism for what the future had in store for them.

Afternote: I just read this on the Chicago Tribune’s website –

Professor Carolyn Rude, chairwoman of the university’s English department, told The Associated Press that Cho’s writing was so disturbing he had been referred to the university’s counseling service.
“Sometimes, in creative writing, people reveal things and you never know if it’s creative or if they’re describing things, if they’re imagining things or just how real it might be,” Rude said. “But we’re all alert to not ignore things like this.”
She said she did not know when he was referred for counseling, or the outcome.

So it seems she noticed, and somebody did refer him to help. She was concerned, but not concerned enough to follow it up – by not doing anything, she did ignore it.