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Tuesday, April 17, 2007

Civilization???

The massacre at Virginia Tech had me in tears as I read the gruesome details of the incident. What can prompt someone to such a dastardly and ghastly act? I ask myself this question over and over again. I shudder repeatedly at the thought that someone can take so many lives. Walk from classroom to classroom shooting scores of your fellow students - what kind of a demented, twisted mind did the shooter have that he could do all this and not flinch one bit?

I do not even know if this is even vaguely connected with this post, but recently I saw an audition for a talent hunt for children on TV. Kids, aged between 5-10 yrs came out dressed in their best, sang their songs and on not being selected, I could see them crying their hearts out. What has been put in their minds at such a tender age, I wondered! That is the age when they should be taught to enjoy participating in a competition and come out happy that they had a good Sunday. Instead, here they were crying their hearts out. What are parents putting in their minds? What was in the mind of this loner that made him do this?

It is easy to blame the oldest of culprits, one that drives a man to abandon all rhyme and reason and behave in an inhuman manner - love. I would beg of everyone involved in the investigation, however, not to trivialize this in the name of love and recognize the deeper malaise within. There is a growing tendency towards violence in this generation and the easy access to guns and the ilk is just making the situation all the more volatile. Teach the younger generation that it is OK to lose sometimes. Teach them to take a loss with a smile and not upon their hearts. It hurts when you lose, but remember that a loss can spur you on to victories later in life, provided you decide to have a later!

My heart goes out to all the 32 casualties and the gunmen himself. He probably needed help, help that he will never get now. The other 32 casualties, I'm stuck here looking at the word casualty and I somehow am ashamed at using that word. The 32 victims of this mindless massacre, all of you are brave people who, I'm sure, must have tried to stand up for each other until the last moment. My heart is with your families, who must have been waiting for you to come back for lunch or dinner...I cannot imagine the extent of their grief at this moment. All I can do is say a silent prayer to god and wish your souls rest in peace.

I read on CNN on that all the students are going to wear their VT hokies as a sign of unity. This is something that I observed in an American campus. Nothing binds people more than a tragedy and the unity that all the students show in the face of such incidents is awe inspiring. Such shows of solidarity after this "tragedy of monumental proportions" - as President George W. Bush put it, make us believe that all is not lost yet. We might still have time to set things right.

RIP: The 33 people killed in the Virginia Tech shootout.

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