Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Why?
I had a nasty feeling all day yesterday and today that something... Something was wrong. Something bad would happen. Something I couldn't understand. But I dismissed them and thought nothing of them, even if there was a small suspicion gnawing away at my mind.

But sadly, I was right.

Today, a little before 11 am, a male student of 22 entered a school building (a college) in northwest part of my country. He was wearing a skimask and carrying a handgun. He made his way into a classroom, and a little before 11 am, he opened fire. After shooting at the students and the police, he turned the gun on himself and shot himself in the head.

Currently, at 6:30 pm, it has been confirmed that the shooter, rushed to the hospital in critical condition, did not make it. Along with him, he took the lives of 10 students and injured a handful more.

Whether it be by irony or by planning, it has been two months shy of a year since the last school shooting that happened in the neighbouring town. Both shootings were executed in the same manner, shooting at students and then shooting themselves, both shooters published numerous movies/writings about their intentions and both shooters cited misanthropy as their cause.

What I find infuriating was not only this gross disrespect of human life, but also the fact that the police had recieved word of the shooter's intentions, interviewed him on Monday but found no reason to arrest him or confiscate his gun or gun licence.

As I listened to the news broadcasts, I felt sick. I wanted to cry. I couldn't finish my dinner because I felt like I'd be seeing it again in a few hours. Why do people do things like this? Why do people copy these atrocious actions? Why didn't anyone do something? I'm not the praying type, but somehow I feel compelled to dedicate a few words to these innocent young men and women who died for nothing before their lives even really begun. As for the shooter, I agree with my mother. He was let off too easy, and I hope that if there is an afterlife, he will suffer for more than a few centuries for killing so many and shattering the lives of so many others.

Both of the shootings within the last year were never truly near my school, and it feels so unreal that it would happen in my school, or that these things have happened at all. But when I start to think about things, how easily these two acquired guns and licenses, how we could do nothing to stop them, how no one saw these coming, I find myself realizing that for the first time in a long time...

I'm afraid to go outside.
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