Muncle
02-16-2008, 09:49 PM
Something�s been bothering me for a few days and I thought I might actually think a bit before typing for a change. If you're looking for jokes, don't bother reading this. First, though, some caveats:
a. I am not advocating discriminately arming students, teachers, and the average citizen. This is a worthy discussion for some future time, but not now.
b. I am not claiming that I would have acted differently that those involved in these situations. Not a religious statement, but I am a confirmed coward, and actually none of us knows how he/she would react in a given situation.
The events at Northern Illinois struck a chord. The truly tragic aspect of the shootings is that we are not really aghast about it. While certainly not commonplace, such events are no longer so rare and so horrifying that they leave us thunderstruck. We almost take them in stride. It�s the same with the serial killers of today. When Charlie Starkweather was on his killing spree in the late �50s in Nebraska, the entire nation watched in horror. He killed 11 people. Hickock and Smith killed �only� four members of the Clutter family in �59 and we still marvel over �In Cold Blood.� In today�s world, killing a family of four or even 11 strangers will get hardly a notice unless the killer has a hook, a �Bind/Torture/Kill� signature like the nut in Kansas or built-in press coverage like the Beltway Sniper. Unless someone kills a good looking blonde, preferably pregnant, woman, nobody really notices once 24 hour news moves on to something else.
But I digress. The overriding reflection I had following the NIU story was �Why didn�t somebody jump the a-hole?� Going back to the Luby�s Cafeteria killings, we have seen a host of multiple victim shootings, normally perpetrated by one or maybe two cretins. They�ve been in stores, offices, churches, subway cars and, most commonly of late, schools. In almost no cases have any of the victims resisted. They�re run, they�ve hidden, but they�ve not fought back. It�s probably happened, but I can�t recall one or two potential victims jumping the gunner and overpowering him. Often you hear of survivors recalling a pause in the shooting while the gunman reloaded. Never has someone taken that opportunity to bash him upside the head with a brick or a stack of text books. The only situation I recall of the victims resisting is Flight 93 and now that action is being debunked by professional conspiracy theorists.
Maybe I watched too many westerns and WWII movies as a kid. Maybe self-preservation and fear have always been such overriding emotions and the shock of the unexpected so great that people do act like deer, freezing in the headlights. Maybe the street-wise guy from Brooklyn or the Iowa farm boy never did throw themselves on the grenade or charge the sniper to save their buds. Maybe the crowd never overpowered the bully. I don�t know.
I�d just like to know why nobody ever fights back.
a. I am not advocating discriminately arming students, teachers, and the average citizen. This is a worthy discussion for some future time, but not now.
b. I am not claiming that I would have acted differently that those involved in these situations. Not a religious statement, but I am a confirmed coward, and actually none of us knows how he/she would react in a given situation.
The events at Northern Illinois struck a chord. The truly tragic aspect of the shootings is that we are not really aghast about it. While certainly not commonplace, such events are no longer so rare and so horrifying that they leave us thunderstruck. We almost take them in stride. It�s the same with the serial killers of today. When Charlie Starkweather was on his killing spree in the late �50s in Nebraska, the entire nation watched in horror. He killed 11 people. Hickock and Smith killed �only� four members of the Clutter family in �59 and we still marvel over �In Cold Blood.� In today�s world, killing a family of four or even 11 strangers will get hardly a notice unless the killer has a hook, a �Bind/Torture/Kill� signature like the nut in Kansas or built-in press coverage like the Beltway Sniper. Unless someone kills a good looking blonde, preferably pregnant, woman, nobody really notices once 24 hour news moves on to something else.
But I digress. The overriding reflection I had following the NIU story was �Why didn�t somebody jump the a-hole?� Going back to the Luby�s Cafeteria killings, we have seen a host of multiple victim shootings, normally perpetrated by one or maybe two cretins. They�ve been in stores, offices, churches, subway cars and, most commonly of late, schools. In almost no cases have any of the victims resisted. They�re run, they�ve hidden, but they�ve not fought back. It�s probably happened, but I can�t recall one or two potential victims jumping the gunner and overpowering him. Often you hear of survivors recalling a pause in the shooting while the gunman reloaded. Never has someone taken that opportunity to bash him upside the head with a brick or a stack of text books. The only situation I recall of the victims resisting is Flight 93 and now that action is being debunked by professional conspiracy theorists.
Maybe I watched too many westerns and WWII movies as a kid. Maybe self-preservation and fear have always been such overriding emotions and the shock of the unexpected so great that people do act like deer, freezing in the headlights. Maybe the street-wise guy from Brooklyn or the Iowa farm boy never did throw themselves on the grenade or charge the sniper to save their buds. Maybe the crowd never overpowered the bully. I don�t know.
I�d just like to know why nobody ever fights back.