Violence prevention requires a community of caring persons. One person alone cannot do it. There are many ways to prevent another tragedy like the tragedy at Virginia Tech in April 2007.
The following are suggestions for what we as responsible adults can do.
We have to create a culture of caring. Plain and simple. I’ve got a lot to say about this, but blogs are supposed to be short so I will write more in another blog.
Cho Seung-Hui, the young man who murdered 32 people at Virginia Tech, was teased and mocked in elementary and secondary school. He was a child who rarely spoke, and when he did, he had a heavy Korean accent and a deep voice. Many other children thought this hilarious and they made fun of him, picked on him.
Many people would never tease a vulnerable person like Cho, but many of us also have no idea what to do to get other people to stop teasing other people. We have to resist thinking it’s funny and that the kids who get mocked deserve it.
Imagine what might have happened if everyone in Cho’s life worked together to figure out how to connect with Cho. Even in the weeks before he committed his atrocities, he still wanted to connect. He stalked girls. He took pictures of them under desks and tables. He wanted to connect but didn’t know how.
What if, when Cho was a child, when he was even more eager to connect, that there had been several people who had taken the time to get to know Cho, to get to know what he liked to do, what interested in him. What if someone said, Hey, Cho, want to go to the movies, to a baseball game, birding, or whatever it was he like to do? What if Cho had connected with someone when he was a child, how different his life would have been.
Whenever a child appears to be lonely, alienated, and the butt of jokes, the whole community must respond with care and compassion. Children, teenagers, adults, parents, teachers, police, whoever might know of a sad and lonely child must be prepared to connect with this sad, alone child. The child needs to feel connected to others.
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