Within two days, there have been two headlining stories about shootings. One in Alabama and one in Germany.
The shootings that have happened since 1996 just make one think, "What is wrong with society? Why are people so mad?" According to infoplease.com - there were almost 50 school shootings since February 2, 1996. That is about 4 shootings a year. . . If anyone may recall on April 20, 1999, the nation's deadliest shooting took place in Littleton, Colo. The Columbine High School, where Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold killed 14 students (including themselves) and one teacher killed, 23 others wounded at Columbine High School. Eric Harris, 18, and Dylan Klebold, 17, had plotted for a year to kill at least 500 and blow up their school. At the end of their hour-long rampage, they turned their guns on themselves. In 2007, the Virginia Tech shooting happened, the shooter, Cho Seung-Hui, killed a total of 33 people (including himself) and injured 15 others. This almost made that the most deadly shooting for the U.S.
According to CBSNews in their article "Why Do School Shootings Happen" dated April 22, 2007, the first known school massacre in this country was in 1927, a revenge killing in Michigan carried out by the treasurer of the local school board, who was convinced high school taxes were the reason his farm was foreclosed.
The most recent school shooting was in Germany Wednesday March 11. Unlike how it happens in the U.S., this 17 year old student went into his former high school and killed at least 15 people before he was shot and killed by the police. According to this article, it was Germany's worst shooting since 2002 when another high school lost 16 students and the gunman. Wednesday's gunman had graduated from Albertville High School in 2008. He had no rhyme or reason to his shootings, they were just at random, shooting students and adults alike.
In Alabama, it is unclear whether the shooter started at his mother's house, starting it on fire while his mother was still inside. He then drove a dozen miles and killed another nine victims. Four of them that happened to be his relatives. The wife of the deputy and their daughter were also shot and killed on that porch. He drove farther and went after more people, shooting another two or three, injuring many. This rampage ended when he had a stand-off with the police, shot at and wounded an officer, and then went into his old workplace (Reliable Metal Products) and shot and killed himself. That brought his death toll up to 11, including himself.
We all know shootings, especially school shootings, are hard to go through. Because everyone is so close and losing a friend is very hard. And for these schools and towns, to make people believe that incidents like that are not what the town/school is really like all the time takes some good PR.
In Valley City, ND, we (because I am from here) once had a nickname of Death Valley, because about 8 or 9 years we had three different incidents within a year span. So it is hard to get people to forget about that kind of stuff when they hear about your town and what nots.
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This is a very serious matter in our schools today. I am going into education and this has to be one of my biggest fears. I am from Valley City as well and those shootings that took place were a very scary thing.I hope that nothing like that ever happens again to Valley City that was a very tragic events to happen in such a small community. It is sad to see that schools shootings are still happening our world. I dont know what is so bad that kids think they need to do such things to each other or others around them such as teachers. I pray everyday that I am lucky and never have to go through something like this during my teaching career.
ReplyDeleteThese statistics just blow my mind (sorry for that). If you look at the violence around the world and in the media, it doesn't take a person long to figure out what is with the youth in todays society. I recently watched a video for my Understanding Media and Social Change class and the statistics left me at a loss for word and thought. A main point that stuck out to me and has fascinated me with it's accurateness is that when we talk about violence or hear about it in the media, we tend to talk about it in a passive tone. We talk about the victims instead of talking about the perpetrators. Also, we generalize who is committing these horrible vicious acts. We don't say that most, if not all, school shootings have been carried out by males. When asked why, we say that we "know it's all males so why does it need to be said?" But in reality, by asking "what is wrong with our youth today?" we are avoiding, what is in my mind, the most crucial fact in the matter, "what is wrong with our male youth?" If males are the ones who commit the violent acts, why not address it as such? This is a spreading and dangerous epidemic and actions must be taken to start fixing it.
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