VA Tech Shooting

They are saying now that not only was it the worst school shooting in American history, but based on the new death toll (in the 30s last I heard) it was the worst shooting ever in American history. Not that a statistic like that matters a lick to the families of the dead or injured.

I first heard when Julie called me. You know everything’s not ok when the first words out of someone’s mouth are: “First of all, everyone you know is ok.” Then I saw an email from Dad at about the same time.

At first, I have to admit, I didn’t really even think about it. When I heard school shooting, I guess I was just thinking along the lines of the UVA shooting where a football player was injured – you know, something bad but not that bad. But that’s not even it – even when I saw the numbers it still didn’t affect me. I was thinking, “Wow, that’s horrible.” But I was still scanning my other emails while listening, but not really listening to Julie.

I called Nathan, because even though I knew he was ok, I figured I should. I think when I heard his voice shaking, that’s when it hit me that this was serious. He couldn’t talk because he was locked down in the building next to where it happened. At the time, they were still pretty unsure of what was going on.

This was all during my lunch break – as I walked back to work I started to get a sinking feeling in my stomach: heavy boots, like Oskar from the Jonathan Safran Foer book would say. I started to see it over and over again in my head, thinking how easy it must have been. I don’t mean to turn this into a post about gun control, but in Virginia there is no state law against the sale or possession of semiautomatic assault weapons (like an AK47). I’m not sure what weapon the shooter had, but Nathan says that a friend of his who heard the gunfire said it was some kind of automatic fire. He could have bought it as legally as he could a hunting rifle. Maybe it wouldn’t have made a difference what kind of gun he had. But it’s a lot easier to kill 31 people when you have a weapon that can fire 100 bullets without reloading.

I was relieved of course. No one that I knew well had been hurt as far as I could tell. Of course then Beth calls and reminds me about Geoff Wilson, saying she couldn’t get in touch with him. I hope that he’s alright.

I don’t know why it hit me as hard as it did. I got really shaken by it, and I kept seeing a classroom - in my head a replica of classrooms at Cabell Hall (no windows, shitty desks) - literally slick with blood. An assault rifle at close range does horrible things to the human body.

Did they hide under their desks? Did they try and rush him to be gunned down? Would I? Could I overcome the fear? Would I even have time to be afraid? Maybe the simpler and better question is would I be able to overcome the nausea? I felt a little sick just thinking about it – how could I handle being there?

What makes a person go to such extremes? Beth told me, and then I saw on the news that there is speculation that this was a jilted boyfriend. Which of course begs the question – was he only after revenge against one person? If so, why on earth would he kill so many? Did he figure that it wouldn’t matter anymore? Does it? Once you are willing to kill one, do numbers really make a difference to you anymore?

I wasn’t there, but when I heard that the killer was dead, I thought, “Thank God.” Not just, thank God the shooting has stopped. Thank God he’s been killed. I don’t think this stems from hate or revenge, although there certainly may have been some of that too. But when someone goes so far to remove themselves from human society are they human anymore? When a dog goes mad and kills a baby you put down the dog. You don’t hate the dog, because it’s just a dog. You put it down because it’s what needs to be done.

Actually I’m not sure if that applies. Maybe anger or hate is a perfectly good reason. As a Christian I want to think forgiveness for everything – maybe everyone should be given the chance for salvation and rehabilitation. But my first thought was still, Thank God.

I hope this isn’t in bad taste. I can’t seem to stop thinking about it, and I can’t get any work done so I thought I’d write it out. I don’t really know what to think – I just have questions that I don’t think can be answered.

-Ben