The Best Motto

Gd, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannon change
Courage to change the things I can
And the wisdom to know the difference.

All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.

You woke up this morning - Congratulations! You got another chance!

Monday, April 23, 2007

VIRGINIA TECH

I do not think were many people in this country who were unaffected by last week's tragedy. I mean, there have to be a special kind of callousness affecting anyone who did not at least for one moment feel sad or angry at the total horror of that mass shooting. Unfortunately, just like with any other national tragedy, the body count did not become final when all kinds of yammering bastards and accompanying them morons crawled out of their respective holes to hammer down their despicable political agenda or just to get some media exposure, or just to publicly re-affirm their total idiocy.

About two hours after the "Breaking News" segment run over the Internet, MSN posted another segment titled something along the lines of "many blame our prevalent gun culture". What bloody gun culture? What we have is a Second Amendment to the Constitution, which reads precisely this: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed. " Now, I am not a lawyer, linguist, or a Constitutional scholar, but what I personally see is this: in order to preserve our country as a free state, we need a regular well trained army, and the rest of the citizens have a constitutional right to keep and bear arms to protect ourselves and to stay free! That right is being systematically stripped away from us. "Guns kill!" "Peaceful gun-free zone!" "If we want to be tough on crime, we have to declare an uncompromising war on firearms!" Blah, blah, blah, blah. There are two clear facts that are so obvious that mentioning them have become a cliche, but somehow they are not obvious to the media and the "Brady Bunch". 1. Guns do not kill people, people kill people. 2. If something is outlawed, it usually becomes the exclusive property of the criminals and the black market. The only people who can not or will not try to get the forbidden item are the proverbial law abiding citizens. There is an overwhelming amount of statistical material available on the Internet that basically repeats one thing over and over again: all the public mass killings were commited in a "gun free" zones. The geographical locations that do not infringe on the Second Amendment rights are usually speared the slaughter, because there is usually somebody with a gun to stop it. But the morally corrupt and hypocritical anti-gun lobby will stop at nothing in order to disarm everyone but themselves and their body guards.

We also did not see the shortage of all kinds of different "experts" all other the place offering the public all kinds of opinions, mostly of psychological nature, mostly moronic, and mostly totally unneeded. But they got their coveted media exposure! What kind of a human worm uses such horror to get media exposure?

Let us also not forget the brave actions of the police. The details are still a bit sketchy, but one question remains: what in blue blazes were they doing in the two-hour interval between the shootings?

Let us also pay a proper tribute to the nincompoops at the Virginia Tech itself. One bright higher-up (unfortunately I do not remember her exact status) had nothing better to do than to yell at the Memorial Service "We will prevail; we are the Virginia Tech!" Prevail over what and how? False bravado and cheerleading have no place at a memorial service. The "religious" part was also very note worthy. The very first to speak was a Muslim representative. Why? Do we have the Muslim majority in the country, in the state of Virginia, at the college itself, or amongst the victims? The Buddhist representative delivered his usual message along the lines of the general goodness of all people, (which, as we all know, the people of Tibet currently experience every day); and now another thirty two families became a living testament to that statement.

Afterwards some Christians expressed their dissatisfaction with the fact that the late JC was not mentioned anywhere, and that it was W's place to do that. As far as I can see, the transcripts of the President's speech definitely have the word "God" in them, and, since, according to the Christian teachings, JC was His son, I don't see any problem with the speech itself. The fact that there was not Christian representation in the "religious" part is another matter entirely. If they went for the "multi-cultural, multi-religious" gambit, why did they exclude the representatives of the religion that is practiced by the majority of the country, majority of the state of Virginia, at least some of the students of the Virginia Tech, and definitely some of the victim's families?

Then there was the ultimate doozy that I also became aware of courtesy of MSN. There was an article about the students hanging the flags and releasing the balloons in honor of the victims. Guess what? There were thirty three balloons! The murderer got honored along with his victims!!! Why?! Why?! Why?!

There was a lot mentioned about the heroic actions of that day. Thank you! Finally something that actually belongs in the media and can not be mentioned enough. Speaking of heroic actions, I can not stop thinking about Liviu Librescu. Nazis and Romanian Communists did not success in crushing decency and humanity out of his Jewish soul. His wife told the media about the e-mails she got from his students crediting him with saving their lives. A cynical portion of my brain can't help but ask: will they remember in twenty years from now that a Jew saved their lives? Will they tell their children?

Something possessed me to look at the pictures of the victims over and over and over again. Every single time tears came to my eyes. Most of the them were so young! I know (and not just believe) that they are in a better place now, devoid of the trials and sorrows of living. But there is a reason all of us are granted hundred twenty years in this world. We all have a purpose in this world, whatever it may be. Most of those lives were cut so short! They were just beginning to live and fulfill that purpose!

When you disregard all surrounding rhetoric and pontifications, all you are left with are thirty two grieving families, some of whom are confined to the most horrible purgatory on earth: that of a parent who have lost his or her child. Time will never eradicate their pain; they will never stop grieving or have a closure. A hole like this can not be filled. May our Heavenly Father watch over all our children!

12 comments:

Moish said...

аминь. http://moish.livejournal.com/6615.html

M_Lokhankin said...

weeeeellll,

according to your statistics, how many people actually managed to protect themselves against an armed attack with their gun?

I am curious.

Moish said...

can't say that i've done a thorough research on the issue, but the logic dictates that if you can defend yourself, you are less likely to become a victim, and have a better chance to protect others. Besides, the only people who will be stopped by more stringent gun control rules are honest folks who don't want to become victims of freaks like Mr. Сунь Хуй (в)Чай

M_Lokhankin said...

well, your logic is faulty. According to statistics, if you possess a gun and attempt to use it, you are several times more likely to be shot and killed by the criminals. The reasoning is as follows - for an average law abiding citizen a) cannot use weapons as well as a criminal, b) is usually not mentally prepared for the attack thus reducing his limited ability to use guns even further while criminal is fully psychologicall ready to use the weapon and c) during the crime, most of the time guns are used as a threat to get compliance from victims, not to kill them. when the criminal sees the gun, he thinks that a victim is as fully prepared to use it as him. hence, he fires...

So statistics doesn't support your claims at all. In addition, when there are guns in the family, family members, including the gun owner, are much more likely to be shot in an accident including this gun, then to protect themselves during the crime.

So guns are really only useful in domestic squabbles, not against professional and not so professional criminals...

Moish said...

Maria,
We are clearly assuming way too many things.
When back in the good old days Rav Kahane (may God avenge his blood) rallied his "Every Jew a '22" campaign, his training included everything from the actual use, to the moral and psychological ramifications of killing a jerk or two.
As to all of the criminals being pros I would disagree again - a friend of mine had a brake-in in his place, so he came out to greed the armed robber with a 10" rambo knife, and told him that he really doesnt give a shit for getting shot as long as he gets to slit the dude's throat as his lifeless body falls on the shooter.
its all about how much we want to be victims and what kind of a message we send to people like Mr. Хуй before they attack.

M_Lokhankin said...

I won't argue that there could be individual cases where someone might be ready to defend himself and that someone was successful is fending off the attack. I am talking about overall statistics. The average Joe doesn't receive full training buying a gun; therefore, he becomes a more likely shooting victim, either during the crime or by accident. And no, many criminals are not professional, but before they set out to commit crime, they are phsychologically ready for the outcomes while most people are caught off guard during the attack.

And any way, since this was a topic of college attack. Do you really think that allowing students having guns on campus is such a great idea?

Moish said...

I was thinking about it. no, it would be wrong to have the students carry guns on campus, BUT... is it because the school is a gun free zone that there was not a single armed guard to stop the psycho?

M_Lokhankin said...

You could put an armed guard on every corner on college, but then psychos like Cho come fully prepared. School guards generally don't expect a shooting rampage in their school and can be easily caught off guard. Shoot two guards at the entrance and you are free to do whatever you want. And it doesn't take long to shoot lots of unarmed people.

You can have more than two and barb wire with metal detectors at all points of entrance, but then you would be killing the spirit of college by turning it into the military zone. It might save lives, but I doubt that many students would be happy with that solution. (parents on the other hand, might...)
I think the problem is that it is hard for people to accept that sometimes there is very little one can do to avoid a psychopath. You can commit all strange kids writing stories on violence, have a cop on every corner, demand document searches at random, etc. But that would remind me so much of my Stepmotherland during 70s and 80s and that wasn't pretty OR safe.

M_Lokhankin said...

what I meant to say is: are you willing to live in constant terror in order to protect yourself against a potential terrorist attack? I don't claim to have an answer to that, I am just posing a question.

Moish said...

I take my Jew-binnie off to you maam.
No I don't want to live in terror, but i want the people whose job it is to prevent terror to live with an understanding that shit can happen at any given moment and w/o a warning. If you are a fan of Castaneda, revisit the Journey to Ixtlan, if not, I was going to post the relevant point in my journal this week, but now you gave me a reason to expedite it

Enthusiastic reader said...

Barbie,
This is definitely getting to be more and more exciting! Your thoughts provoke discussions, you are being quoted in other blogs... Goodness, it's practically scientific!

Moish said...

dude, are you gay or what?