I was sitting in my high school calculus class in Englewood, Colorado, a suburb of Denver, when, halfway through, one of my classmates shows up, declaring with a laugh that there was some sort of "hostage situation" at Columbine and all the classes were watching it. None of us took it as anything serious either when we first heard it, after all, what could possibly go wrong in Littleton? But our curiosity had been piqued, any desire of ours to learn was immediately abandoned, and we turned on the TV. From that moment until I went to bed that night, all I saw was the view of the familiar school from the news helicopter. I had been there just a couple weekends before for a debate tournament, and seeing Columbine, a run-of-the-mill suburban high school, suddenly thrust into the news in such a manner was, to say the least, mind-boggling. It became much more than mind-boggling as the magnitude of what had transpired became clear, and I remember the shock and disbelief I felt when Detective Stone of the Jefferson County police reported that as many as 25 students might be dead. At Columbine? It's still weird.
The rest of that day at school, classes were not important. No one cared about learning. But recently, as the country acknowledged the one-year anniversary of the massacre, I realized that I had learned more from Columbine than I ever could have cared to know about humanity, about society and about how much it sucks. I may not have learned any physics that day, but since then the tragedy has taught me something much more important, even if it was depressing.
One year later, we should be remembering and honoring the victims and rethinking our approach to gun control. Unfortunately, the families of the victims would have it otherwise. When I proclaim how humanity errs, I'm not just referring to Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris -- I'm referring to the families of the victims, who corrupted what should be a day of mourning and remembrance by filing a lawsuit against the Jefferson County police.
As if the shooting weren't enough, on April 19, one day before the one-year anniversary, the families of the victims sued the police, squeezing it in before the one-year statute of limitations on lawsuits of that nature expired. If the timing of the lawsuit, which appears to be a last-ditch attempt at finding someone to blame, isn't bad enough, then it's the reason for filing it. They claim the police mishandled the situation: they had the opportunity to kill Klebold but didn't, and a police bullet killed one of the victims. Considering the circumstances, the police did as much as they could -- they went around the school freeing the people trapped inside and kept a constant watch to make any advance they could without doing anything to threaten lives. Sometimes I wonder why we need police in crime-free suburban Denver at all, let alone police expected to deal with such an extraordinarily unexpected situation like Columbine, making their efforts, in my opinion, commendable. This is no time to be throwing blame around. The families of the victims have been through so much and have the right to feel helpless and inconsolable, but turning around and blaming the police will do nothing but stir up more pain.
Whether you believe it possible or not, this ties in with the sale of Ben and Jerry's to an enormous multinational corporation, a sell-out big enough to disillusion the most die-hard anti-establishment hippies. They didn't have to sell out -- whether or not they became part of a massive conglomerate they would have remained one of the top ice cream sellers around -- but I guess it is easy to blame capitalism. They were helpless pawns, of course.
As long as the blame keeps getting pinned on these benign institutions the real issue becomes muddled. Society won't pull itself out of the gutter until people do their part to get it and keep it on its feet. This means no senseless lawsuits and no selling out just because it's what everybody does. Suing the police before the statute of limitations wore off belittles something that must be recognized and remembered. Selling out and then blaming an abstract idea for being forced into selling out is just a cop-out, an avoidance of where the problem really lies. It's everybody's society; it's not fair to anyone if you just let it exist as it is, play along doing what you know is wrong, and assume it will never improve. Until people actually make a concerted effort to do the right thing instead of leaving well enough alone well, you get the idea.
Since we all have the potential to make a difference instead of sitting idly by and watching society go down the toilet, or, even worse, helping to flush, this would be a good time to bring up the SLI. Lucky for you, I won't. This is much bigger than Dartmouth. We may all be single people but we can't resign ourselves to selling out to mediocrity just because it's easier. Call me a romantic, but it's possible to mourn without trying to get something out of it, and it's possible to run a successful business with the right philosophy. Neither of these options entails placing blame; both involve standing up against a negative trend. Make your voice heard, make a stand for what's right, and make this a society that we all deserve, a society above and beyond what these couple instances of humanity at its worst reveal. Is it really worth it letting some isolated tragedies tear society apart?
