of Imus and the Virginia Tech shootings

Well, a sad week. This post will probably be pretty long. Those of you who object to reading "novels" might therefore want to skip over this post.

Monday's tragic happenings at Virginia Tech have knocked the Don Imus thing off the radar, at least for now, but I did promise to address that issue. So here goes.

First of all, let it be said that I am caucasian, and therefore cannot relate to how it feels to be black and be called a n-----, or a "nappy-haired ho". In fairness, I am a woman, and do know how it feels not to be given a fair shake due to that. I know, for example, that no man has ever had to field the amount of questions from well-meaning family and friends that I and many women nowadays do who put off (or decide to forgo) the marriage and children thing. You know the questions: "When are you getting married? When are you going to settle down and have kids?" As if somehow, if you don't, you're less of a woman, or have somehow failed to fulfill a purpose that apparently you must fulfill in order to have validity or stature as a "real woman". I was so relieved when I turned 40 and didn't have to deal with that nonsense anymore. And is there a woman out there who hasn't wished she had the height and strength of the lesser quality men who use those advantages to dominate us in personal as well as business relationships? I will not go into the differences in earnings between the sexes or any of the other typical gender battles, as I have digressed, and I believe I've made my point.

Not to say that this is even close to what black people have had to endure. And as has been stated elsewhere, God, to be black and female! It is definitely true that our society has a long way to go in terms of race relations. But I think the problem is alot bigger than that.

Once I read a book called "Miss 4th of July, Goodbye" about a Greek family that emigrated to West Virginia during WWI, was subjected to prejudice due to being foreigners, was threatened by, and fought back against, the KKK. The book was made into a movie for the Disney Channel starring Louis Gossett, Jr. and Roxana Zal. The book was written by Christopher Janus, and I highly recommend it. During the course of a conversation with his daughter Niki (the protagonist), her father George tells her, "Remember this, Niki: One way or another, everybody finds a n----- to kick around."

To my way of thinking, that right there is the crux of the problem. Just as the first instinct of many human beings is to strike out violently when we are angry, it seems that another toxic first instinct that we must own and master within ourselves is the tendency, especially when we feel frustrated with our lot in life, to immediately find somebody to feel superior to and kick around, figuratively or literally. Even in these United States, where all "men" are created equal, we have this problem. White vs. black, men vs. women, rich vs. poor, gay vs. straight, Christian vs. Moslem. And I know that you can pick out of each pair mentioned which one feels just a little superior, and which one gets kicked. I even saw an article in a magazine several months back about there being a division between women who stay at home and women who work outside the home!

My point is we will all have our differences. If we were all alike, as it is often said, it would be a boring world. Diversity should be a cause for celebration, not persecution. We as individuals need to cop to our tendency to hierarchize our place in the world, and our tendency to want to feel superior, and find a way to make peace with who and what and where we are in our little section of the mud ball. Our problem is not "out there", in others. We have seen the enemy, it is said, and he is us.

My kudos to the young women of the Rutgers basketball team for their grace in this situation, for their excellence on and off the basketball court.

As for the Virginia Tech tragedy, my God, where to start? My usual rant in a situation like this is where was everybody? Why didn't somebody see something was up and try to intervene? The problem nowadays is that we have forgotten how to be our brother's keeper, etc. etc. But we cannot fault the classmates and faculty at the college for not attempting to intervene. It is plain that they tried to intervene several times, to no avail. Tipped off by the young man's roommate, a magistrate ordered Seung-Hui Cho to submit to a psychiatric evaluation. The psychiatrist deemed Cho as perhaps a danger to himself, but not to anybody else. His guns were bought totally legally. He had never been convicted of a crime. His mental health issues resulted in a short-term, voluntary stay in a hospital, the termination of that stay equally voluntary, explaining why it was never mentioned in any record that would exempt him from owning a gun. The two young women that he allegedly sent inappropriate messages to declined to press charges. So it is obvious that once the young man got to college, people did try to call attention to his condition, only to apparently run up against a brick wall.

Of course this young man's problems started a long time ago. We know for sure he was bullied in high school, and probably long before that. We don't know what, if anything, his parents, neighbors, teachers, etc. did to try and stop the downward spiral the young man was on before he got to college. One thing I know, though: the younger the person, the better the chance of reversing such a violent, destructive mindset. Cho was about, what, 21 or 22 years old? How old is too old to fix mental illness like this? Does anyone know? Why don't we know?

I have listened to talk shows and read message boards ad nauseum the past few days. Some posters and talksters blamed the mental health professionals. They were trained, one argued. Regular people saw there was a problem, but the shrinks should have seen the extent of it and done something. But psychiatry is in its infancy, as much as people may not want to hear that fact. We don't know nearly as much as we need to know about the human body, and the brain is probably the biggest mystery to us. I suspect much of the testing to probe and understand the human brain may have been beyond us until very recently. And where is the funding for said testing? I was molested when I was a kid, and tho I am not going to get into THAT subject now, I will say this: I believe that many answers as to why some people become molesters are in the brains of those who were molested and went on to molest; those who weren't molested and went on to molest; and those like me who were molested and didn't go on to molest. And when we get off our duff, get our priorities straight, and put our money into studying things that will actually help us, and not the mating habits of the tsetse fly, we may be able to solve alot of our problems. Like molestation. And maybe even paranoid psychosis/schizophrenia.

The usual suspects pop up in the posts: guns, lack of religion/morality, the media, liberals, parents, psychiatrists, etc. But one young lady, a shining light to me, sees it the way I do. She posted on the MSNBC message boards as "Shut Up Girl". I tried to reply to her and get her permission to use her post here, or have her share her thoughts in a reply to this post, but I couldn't get logged in to MSNBC's site. I am going to share some of what she said here. I hope she won't mind.

"What the gunmen do is wrong and there is nothing that changes that fact; but we are ignorant to think that there is no one else at fault.


"...(we) have done a horrible job of teaching our children how to value each other. (We say) be successful, be important, earn money, be popular, but how often do we ever say, 'Be kind' or 'It is never OK to hurt someone.'

"There are some people who have not failed to teach this lesson, but this is the exception, not the rule.

"Everyone is so concerned about being cool, or worrying about themselves that they never stop to think how they might be hurting someone else.

"I have a hard time believing that no one can seem to figure out WHY these things happen; I think it is more along the lines that no one wants to admit why it happens.

"You are guilty every time you mock someone, every time you laugh at them, every time you snicker or point.

"You are guilty, every time you sneer at someone, every time you tell them how they have failed, and every time you make them feel as if they are never good enough to be your friend, or achieve their dreams.

"...We are blind to the pain around us, or maybe more importantly, we just don't seem to care. We are raised in a society that you can never let down your walls, or someone will dig that knife in a bit deeper. When all you really want to do is to know that someone understands how you feel and that someone cares and (will) not use that pain to hurt you even more.

"But that would be too much effort.

"When it comes right down to it, most of them are just angry that no one cares how much they are hurting, and they want others to understand just how far they have been pushed.

"In their minds, what better way to hurt others like they have been hurt, than to do something they have no choice but to notice?

"And that's the reality, whether we like it or not.

"We avoid talking about it, we just gloss it up and pretend not to notice our own role in what happens because it is easier to just blame insanity.

"We need to stop being blind and start leading by example.

..."Christian, Pagan, Agnostic...there is no shield for our actions; because let's face it, sometimes religion gets treated like a way of telling ourselves that we are good people, even as we are doing horrible things.

"And a way of trying to wash hands of any possible guilt, or possible blame.

"There is only one way to stop these sort of things, and I don't think the human race is really up to doing that just yet.

"We need to start caring more, and we need to start caring about the right things. Would these shooters exist if we didn't create them? Would these shooters exist if someone had taken the time to actually notice their pain and do something other than humiliate them with it?

"Think, people. And stop being so blind.

"This world depends on it."

Thank you, Shut Up Girl. I couldn't have said it better; that's why I quoted you. And yes, folks, I know that concerned people tried to intervene at VT; but what about before that? To try to make a difference when someone is as mentally ill as this young man was is damn near impossible. It doesn't happen very often, but I agree with President Bush: When you see someone who is acting that messed up, call attention to it, and don't quit until someone does something about it. It is your business, and it's just possible that if you don't do something, no one else will, and it is also possible that someone else's problems can quickly be made your business, just like this.

I would just like to add: Are the people who always say that people need to face consequences of actions the same people who are saying they don't want to see anymore of Cho's video or hear his ranting; the same ones who are blaming the shrinks, Virginia Tech, parents, liberals, guns, etc., instead of admitting that once again, we have seen the enemy, and he is us? Because who is "our society" if not us?

On a lighter note: If anyone is still with me, I would like to thank my Pittsburgh Penguins, who came out on the wrong end of the Stanley Cup Quarterfinals 4 games to 1, to the Ottawa Senators, after losing Game 5 by a score of 3-0. To the Penguin team: Thank you for a great year. You gave us lots of thrills and great times this year. You gave us a new arena, and hockey in Pittsburgh for another 30 years. The city of Pittsburgh loves its Penguins, and we loved cheering you on. Your learning curve was alot shorter than we could've ever dreamed, and we're looking forward to cheering you on again next year. We know you're just gonna keep getting better, and we're looking forward to taking that ride with you. Thanks to the Ottawa Senators, who gave our Pens something to measure up to. Ottawa, I just want you to know: you may have dominated our Pens this time, but we're gonna dominate you (and everyone else) the same way, only more, in a couple of years. Keep looking in your rearview mirrors, Sens. See that black and gold blur behind you? That's our Pens -- they're gaining on you. Enjoy your time in the sun, Sens. It ain't gonna last forever. [Claudia's note, 4/17/08, with the 2007-08 quarterfinals between the Pens and the Sens complete, with the Pens sweeping the series 4-0, I rest my case on that subject. Even if the Pens don't win another playoff game this year, I feel vindicated.] That said, I hope the team that took the Penguins takes it all!

Good vibes to all of you (the Senators, too)!

Claudia