Come Again?
In an intriguing if not entirely convincing think-piece on the Virginia Tech killer, I came across this quote from Francis Fukuyama: “It really is young men between 15 and 30 who are responsible the vast majority of crimes, although it is politically incorrect to say this too loudly.”
Actually, it's politically incorrect to say almost anything else.
posted by LAGuy @ 12:44 AM
6 Comments:
To call this rambling gibberish a "think piece," is way too generous. It's not entirely convincing? Of what is it even trying to convince us? That the "feminization" of the world, as evidenced by young women who "act like men" because they have sex the way men have always wanted them to (i.e., without demanding a commitment), drove this maniac to kill 32 people? (That description of the point of the piece is unfairly coherent.)
I know the substance of the piece was not the main point of your blog, but I still have to say: "Come again?"
I liked a lot of the piece because, more than anything else I'd seen or read, it got into the activities of the killer, as well as some of his motivations and his place in society in general.
It was a surprisingly good piece of reporting, even if the speculation of others it quotes wasn't too piercing.
Here is the second paragraph of "reporting":
"High on his list were his classmates from Westfield high school who jeered at him to 'go back to China' without bothering to check his nationality. Two of them -- who happened to attend Virginia Tech -- were going to pay later that day. Then there were the college girls who reported him to the police for stalking and got him carted off to mental hospital after he sent them shy love messages full of yearning."
Is the writer claiming that the dead Westfield High School classmates were actually among those who told him to "go back to China"? It reads that way, but I doubt it.
The college girls, who are derided later in the article for "not having the brains to recognize that he was quoting Romeo and Juliet" in his "shy love notes," were among the few whose actions actually led to his getting some (temporary) psychiatric help. They apparently correctly read his serious instability and potential violence between the lines -- whatever their ability to recognize quotes from literature may have been. Yet this author derides them and clearly suggests that the killings were motivated by their alleged promiscuity.
This is horror movie morality. The reality is, this guy's brain was seriously diseased. It's sad and a terrible tragedy, but I seriously doubt that one of these girls being kind to him or getting involved with him in any way would have prevented his ultimately becoming violent. I also don't believe every girl at Virginia Tech remaining chaste would have helped.
I'm not sure how you read that the author blames the killings on the promiscuity of the women on campus. The discussion is about how this was one of the reasons given by a deluded killer, not something the women (no matter what their sex lives were like) are to blame for.
If some of the women at Virginia Tech had shown more affection to Cho, would he have not gone on a killing rampage? We'll never know, but it's certainly possible. He still would have had serious mental problems, but his actions might have been different. Once again, this of course in no way excuses what he did, or puts the women who ignored or avoided him at fault.
Would he(cho) felt better had they actually taken the trouble to check his nationality and told him to go back to Korea?
This is why I think the author is suggesting the women are at least partially at fault:
"The pervasive hookup culture at college, where girls are prepared to sleep with boys they barely know or fancy, can be a source of seething resentment for those who are left out.
'Young women now seem to want to behave like men and have sex without commitment. The signals they are giving are very confusing, and rage and humiliation build up in boys who are spurned again and again.'"
This is not stated even arguably as being from the killer's point of view. It is commentary offered by the author with quotes by Camille Paglia offered as expert opinion.
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