I wasn't going to post on this

[muckefuck]

I've read a lot of sad things in the wake of Blacksburg, among them that_dang_otter's bitter point that, on average, more Americans than died there are killed every day in the USA, but since they're not all killed in one place, they don't garner the same kind of attention. We can glimpse just how inured we've become to their deaths by the fact that the officials at VA Tech weren't willing to cancel classes for 20,000 on account of only two on-campus murders. It makes me wonder what their cut-off was: Four students? Ten? Would it be the same for faculty and/or staff? What's the quota where I work? And has it changed in light of Monday's events?

But I think the saddest thing I've read so far is this:

Kim Min-kyung, a South Korean student at Virginia Tech reached by telephone from Seoul, said there were about 500 Koreans at the school, including Korean-Americans. She said she had never met Cho. She said South Korean students feared retaliation and were gathering in groups.

I so dearly wish I could say they were just being paranoid, but I'm too well acquainted with human nature--and past reactions to massacres with minority perpetrators--to say that.

Comments

[muckefuck.livejournal.com]

Odd, the impression I've gotten from browsing the headlines is exactly the opposite. I see a surprising amount of shame--to the point where people were talking about sending a delegation from Seoul to Blacksburg to apologise in person for Cho's actions.

At least they're consistent. Whenever an American serviceman abroad is accused or convicted of some harm against against Korean civilians, there are shrill denunciations of the USA and its "shame" for letting "one of its own" commit such vile acts. I used to think that was all just political posturing, but now I see they apply the same standards to their own citizens.

[bunj.livejournal.com]

Apparently, he also watched "Oldboy" repeatedly in the days before the event. Media outlets are already contrasting some of the pictures he sent to NBC with movie stills of actors in similar poses (Cho even posed with a hammer). Expect lots of hand-wringing commentaries about the violence of S. Korean cinema.

[wwidsith.livejournal.com]

Hmm, interesting, good links there, thanks.