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Wednesday, April 18, 2007
How soon we forget after tragedies
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The West Ambler-Johnston Hall was an all-girls dorm when Lee Loving attended Virginia Tech.
Now it’s coed.
Loving found that out Monday as he watched TV coverage of the massacre at his alma mater. He didn’t know what had happened until a co-worker shipped him an e-mail around 1 p.m.
“I didn’t have the TV on,” said Loving, a 1977 Tech grad who majored in finance and insurance.
Now, it’s hard to turn it off. For Loving, and many of us.
This is a familiar script. We know our cues, what roles to play. And we play them well, on autopilot.
A tragedy — and in the case of Virginia Tech, the word is apropos — takes place. The media exhaust nearly every obvious angle then create a few. This tragedy carries an irresistible headline: “Deadliest shooting rampage in modern U.S. history.”
Tech-savvy college students post comments on blogs, Web sites and Face book. Those who were caught in the midst of the chaos send text messages or call news outlets to share stories. Talking heads and experts offer up instant political and personal analyses.
Elected officials (President Bush) and aspiring politicians (U.S. Sen. Barack Obama) send their condolences. Vigils, memorial services and convocations take place. Thousands attend. They light candles, sign sympathy boards, cry, pray, stare silently. Wonder.
There’s nothing inherently wrong with any of this. My question, though, is this:
What do we change, collectively and individually, in the weeks, months and years after the credits run for this two-hour rampage?
What do we do to help erase, even remotely, the chance of something like this happening again?
“We get back to life too soon,” said Robert Pulley, a Norcross waiter who graduated with a psychology degree from Virginia Tech in 1995. “For the families of the victims, it will be with them forever. For the rest of us, we respect their mourning and loss, but we get back to life very soon.
“You take five minutes out, catch your breath and move on. I know I have to work tomorrow.”
Pulley doesn’t mean to be callous. He’s just calling it like he sees it, the way we are.
After Sept. 11, displaying a U.S. flag became the “in thing.” You couldn’t drive down a road in Gwinnett without seeing them pasted on vehicles. I often wondered whether the drivers lived a life that embodied the spirit of the Stars and Stripes.
Look at cars on the road today. Those flags, generally, have long lost their luster. And they haven’t been replaced. Symbolic outrage one minute. Indifference the next.
Ultimately, Cho Seung-Hui, the alleged gunman in the Virginia Tech massacre, is responsible for his actions. Nobody else is.
But disturbed individuals like him are still our problem, and we ought to reach out. Talk to them, or at least talk to somebody who can help. Exhibit goodwill.
That’s not us, though. Seldom do we get involved. We shy away from troubled people, even when we live among them.
Not all snap, arm themselves with weaponry and go hunting for humans.
It can happen, though.
We saw it at Columbine High. We saw it at the University of Texas at Austin.
And we saw it Monday.
“If there is ever a time that the school will pull together, it’s now,” Loving, the Virginia Tech grad who lives in Snellville, told me.
“Hopefully, students will reach out even more to those who they see shunning themselves from others. Maybe they will be more sensitive.”
We all should be.
Rick Badie’s column usually appears on Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Contact him at 770-263-3875 or e-mail rbadie@ajc.com.
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