yesterday’s shooting was beyond tragic words alone cannot convey the sympathy and horror felt due to the event. Across facebook people have been posting frantically about gun control and placing the blame on the fact god has been taken out of school.
This examiner happened to stumble across the words of morgan freeman and his thoughts on the event on friday as well as other mass shootings.
Morgan freeman:
"you want to know why. This may sound cynical, but here's why.
It's because of the way the media reports it. Flip on the news and watch how we treat the batman theater shooter and the oregon mall shooter like celebrities. Dylan klebold and eric harris are household names, but do you know the name of a single victim of columbine? Disturbed
people who would otherwise just off themselves in their basements see the news and want to top it by doing something worse, and going out in a memorable way. Why a grade school? Why children? Because he'll be remembered as a horrible monster, instead of a sad nobody.
Cnn's article says that if the body count "holds up", this will rank as the second deadliest shooting behind virginia tech, as if statistics somehow make one shooting worse than another. Then they post a video interview of third-graders for all the details of what they saw and heard while the shootings were happening. Fox news has plastered the killer's face on all their reports for hours. Any articles or news stories yet that focus on the victims and ignore the killer's identity? None that i've seen yet. Because they don't sell. So congratulations, sensationalist media, you've just lit the fire for someone to top this and knock off a day care center or a maternity ward next.
You can help by forgetting you ever read this man's name, and remembering the name of at least one victim. You can help by donating to mental health research instead of pointing to gun control as the problem. You can help by turning off the news."
freeman’s words give pause for thought and reflection. I pose this question to the reader: What do you think? Are people seeking attention and notoriety because of the way the media portrays them? People who commit suicide often feel like they are alone and a nobody. In this case did lanza decide he wanted to go down in history books by making his name synonymous with monstrosity?
I’m not sure we will ever truly know why the events unfolded the way they did. Let’s take freeman’s advice and remember the names of the children we lost.
Sandy hill students:
- charlotte bacon, 2/22/06, female
- daniel barden, 9/25/05, male
- rachel davino, 7/17/83, female.
- olivia engel, 7/18/06, female
- josephine gay, 12/11/05, female
- ana m. Marquez-greene, 04/04/06, female
- dylan hockley, 3/8/06, male
- dawn hocksprung, 06/28/65, female
- madeleine f. Hsu, 7/10/06, female
- catherine v. Hubbard, 6/08/06, female
- chase kowalski, 10/31/05, male
- jesse lewis, 6/30/06, male
- james mattioli , 3/22/06, male
- grace mcdonnell, 12/04/05, female
- anne marie murphy, 07/25/60, female
- emilie parker, 5/12/06, female
- jack pinto, 5/06/06, male
- noah pozner, 11/20/06, male
- caroline previdi, 9/07/06, female
- jessica rekos, 5/10/06, female
- avielle richman, 10/17/06, female
- lauren russeau, 6/1982, female (full date of birth not specified)
- mary sherlach, 2/11/56, female
- victoria soto, 11/04/85, female
- benjamin wheeler, 9/12/06, male
- allison n. Wyatt, 7/03/06, female
There just are no words
