[Bryan C.]

In this country it seems that there are always people trying to help kids in schools by providing more guidance counselors and police officers or metal detectors. As a kid in grade school, I found that all kids are pretty much messed up in the head. Love and peace need to be taught, not fear. If more guidance counselors is the answer - well, school systems are going to go broke. More police may make students more fearful. Whehter people want to admit it or not, this is an authoritarian society, and there will be no changes until the person on the bottom of the totem poll is heard.

User Detail :  

Name : Bryan C., Gender : M, Sexual Orientation : Gay, Religion : Agnostic, Age : 20, City : Knoxville, State : TN Country : United States, Occupation : Student, Education level : 2 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

[R.N. Mohan]

I do not attempt to justify the shooting and I think it is a terrible thing to happen. But, even though the writings of the two boys and their friends keep saying that they were bullied badly and humiliated and beaten up almost daily, why is nobody even talking about this aspect of the problem? Also, how serious is this problem of discrimination against people who are different in schools in the United States? Mohan.

User Detail :  

Name : R.N. Mohan, Gender : M, Sexual Orientation : Gay, Race : Asian, Religion : Atheist, Age : 24, City : Bangalore, State : NA Country : India, Occupation : Student, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

[Craig]

I have often wondered this myself. It is like a man kicking his dog for years, and one day, the dog biting the man on the leg, and the man saying, 'How could this happen?' When I was in school, a few star athletes nominated a homely girl with slight retardation for Homecoming Queen as a joke. (Yes, stories like Carrie actually happen.) I remember watching cheerleaders ask a painfully shy girl if she was a lesbian, and laughing at her. One of my friends told me his gym coach even led the taunting. If we admit that most humans would break down with this kind of constant harrassment, we must also admit that one of the ways they break down is to kill themselves, and accept some accountability. There have been numerous movies about it: The Breakfast Club, Heathers, Carrie, Revenge of the Nerds, Welcome Back Roxy Carmichael. A review of Welcome to the Dollhouse said that it was relentlessly cruel and a bad film because it didn't let the viewer off the hook. It was, in other words, what some people go through in real life. Is it really a serious problem? Read this link and judge for yourself: http://www.youth.org/loco/PERSONProject/Alerts/States/Michigan/nabozny.html

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Name : Craig, Gender : M, Race : White/Caucasian, Age : 37, City : Minneapolis, State : MN Country : United States, 

[Leah26116]

Yes, the problem is severe. I was a 'nerd' in high school, and I hated everyone I went to high school with. I suffered some pretty severe self-esteem issues until I was about 25. I see it today too, because I work with troubled youth. Kids are cruel and do not realize how badly they hurt other kids. It also seems that teachers do nothing about this. In my high school when I talked to teachers about it, they told me to 'toughen up.' I'm not excusing what happened, but some kids have a shorter fuse than others.

User Detail :  

Name : Leah26116, Sexual Orientation : Bisexual, Race : White/Caucasian, Age : 27, City : Erie, State : PA Country : United States, Education level : 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

[M-Kemper22529]

This is a problem that is not talked about in American society. Within our school system, students are often isolated and targeted for bullying. Quite often these students group with other students that have been targeted in a similar fashion.

Everything I am hearing in the media indicates that the 'Trench Coat Mafia' of Columbine High School were just such a group. If these same kids had met under any different circumstances, they might not have ever become friends.

I have brought this subject up with other people since the shootings and their reactions were the same. Many kids are bullied while they're in school, but they don't pack guns and build bombs to use against their fellow classmates.

The circumstances in this case cannot be narrowed to just one thing. The problems they had in school with bullying probably helped to fuel other problems they were having, whether at home or elsewhere.

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Name : M-Kemper22529, Gender : F, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : White/Caucasian, Age : 30, City : Tampa, State : FL Country : United States, Social class : Middle class, 

[A. Jacobs]

I am a goth of sorts, and as such have experienced the alienation those boys experienced. Yet never have I wanted to kill or hurt someone for it. My goth friends and I agree: Our sympathy will always be with the students who were killed and their families - not with the murderers.

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Name : A. Jacobs, Gender : M, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Jewish, Age : 15, City : Elkins Park, State : PA Country : United States, Occupation : HS student, Education level : Less than High School Diploma, Social class : Upper middle class, 

[Brendan-W]

I agree (my wife thinks I am crazy). Not that I expected it, but I felt an ultimate expression of this sort could come if one of the ministers giving the eulogy at the funeral of a victim would dare bring this up. It just is not done in our society; but this shooting has changed society.

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Name : Brendan-W, Gender : M, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : White, Age : 29, State : Maine Country : United States, 

[Anna23834]

I'm almost 40 and I'm still trying to comprehend and heal from the cruel treatment I received in high school. Not only did few teachers notice or act, some were complicit and joined in, I think as a way of bonding with their students. Teachers want to be cool, too, and it's not cool to challenge what the media calls "high school subculture." What's worse now is how much that subculture is now mainstream culture. Craig mentioned a homely and mildly retarded girl being ridiculed at school; well, the same jokes now play on morning radio shows (not just Howard Stern). Making fun of someone's looks, weight, accent, etc. is a mainstay of popular humor, and adults are now modeling this behavior for kids. They may mock-scold themselves for doing it, but the message is that the fun outweighs the harm done.

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Name : Anna23834, Gender : F, Race : White/Caucasian, Age : 39, City : Los Angeles, State : CA Country : United States, Social class : Middle class, 

[Shannon M.]

I think the whole trench coat portion of the Columbine shootings has been blown way out of proportion. They were two very angry, mentally ill teens with the means to get revenge in the worst possible way. It matters not that they wore trench coats, just like it would matter not if they were thugs or preps or any other "category."

What is important to take from this is that you should treat others as you would like to be treated, not as you would not like to be treated.

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Name : Shannon M., Gender : F, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Unitarian, Age : 15, City : Merritt Island, State : FL Country : United States, Occupation : High school student, Education level : Less than High School Diploma, Social class : Middle class, 

[Elric L.]

The thing that amazes me the most about the Columbine tragedy is that so many people are surprised it happened. Aside from the other instances of school violence, this shouldn't have been unexpected, and judging from some of the other responses, I'm not alone in my thinking. After all, far too many kids look at school more as a prison sentence than a learning experience, and the treatment they receive only bears this out. When one is trapped in an unbearable situation, one will do anything to change it. These boys took revenge on their tormentors, and who among us, if given the chance, wouldn't have relished the opportunity to do the same? A fairly grim look at human nature, but a necessary one.

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Name : Elric L., Gender : M, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Pagan, Age : 29, City : Pasadena, State : MD Country : United States, Education level : 2 Years of College, Social class : Upper class, 

[Tom-L24148]

Columbine High School sounds pretty typical of American secondary institutions: A clear pecking order, with the jocks and cheerleaders at the top, and then a descending order that everyone there knows, including the teachers and administrators. As in any barnyard, any chicken can peck at any other lower on the pecking order. In a high school, nobody wants to challenge this order - including the faculty - because they will suffer the same fate as the scorned kids. And, yes, even if teachers disagree, they end up complicit because they don't do or say anything that's going to make their own lives miserable. For them, high school is not just a four-year sentence. A few years ago, Carl Berstein (then of the Washington Post) was invited to give the commencement speech at the surburban Maryland high school from which he had been graduated. His speech greatly distressed the faculty, because he said that his own career demonstrated that you could be a failure in high school and still be a success in life. In fact, as I recall, he argued that being a high school success had absolutely no correlation with succeeding in the rest of your life. Most of the students stood and cheered (not, I'm sure, the jocks and cheerleaders). Finally, somebody told them that the all-American high school was not the mold that determined the rest of their lives.

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Name : Tom-L24148, Gender : M, Sexual Orientation : Gay, Race : White/Caucasian, Age : 55, City : Washington, State : DC Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, 

[Lindsay H.]

My family lived in that area close to 10 years, and the thinking that went on was very close-minded. In other words, if your kid did not "fit in," he or she was left out. This means social gatherings and friendships.

My daughter, who is hearing-impaired and was somewhat non-conformist in her dress, went to Chatfield High, which is only four or five miles from Columbine High. Most of the kids there acted like she was from outer space.

In addition, these kids had no parental supervision (or very little) and way, way too much money in their hands. Many "friendships" were built on how big a house you had or how much your mom or dad made.

I'm sorry, but I really feel these parents came home and never tried to know who their children were or are. How often did they sit down and talk ... not lecture, correct or put the morality and bias of their parents' feelings into them? Not often, I think. And how often did they ask their kids how they really felt without the fear of repercussions?

My son thought also Hitler was a great guy and that he had it all right (this was in 1993 or 1994), and I asked him just how much history had he read. He replied that he had really only read Mien Kampf. My son is also profoundly deaf ... I told him that not only would he have been eliminated by Hitler, but that his other deaf friends, his mother and father and sister would have been, too. Then I took him to the library and checked some books out on the Holocaust. Woke him up big time ... Thank you , Lord!

We as parents have an obligation to know or at least try and keep tabs on our children and not turn a blind eye to their doings - even if it doesn't fit into our schedule. Our kids deserve the very best from us. If we don't give it to them, who will?

User Detail :  

Name : Lindsay H., Gender : F, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Disability : Deaf, Race : White/Caucasian, Age : 49, City : San Antonio, State : TX Country : United States, Occupation : self-employed, Education level : 2 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

[Pat J.]

What happened in Littleton, Co., is part of the on-going class struggle that's been going on in this country from the time we set foot on this continent's shores; and we carried our class struggles with us. Remember Al Capone's behavior? Where were his parents and the "system" when he was doing his self-destructive thing? I want to live in a free world. What are we teaching our kids?

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Name : Pat J., City : Overland Park, State : KS Country : United States, 

[Laura26060]

The amount of scapegoating that goes unchecked in our public school system is criminal. I am so sick of listening to schools blame parents, the media, bad kids, anything but their own lack of responsibility toward their students. I am an educator, and of course my students were quite upset by the Columbine massacre. But none were surprised. Virtually every one of my students related incidents from high school where they were tormented and teachers did nothing to stop it. And indeed, in some cases, the teachers abetted it. The response was uniformly, "That's life, get over it."

That kind of behavior, name-calling, verbal and sometimes physical abuse, and worse, wouldn't be tolerated by the teachers for one second if it were their colleagues tormenting them. Someone would be fired or possibly arrested. Why then is this seen as acceptable behavior by teachers if it's done to a student by a student, or at least something they don't feel compelled to stop? And then they wonder why the scapegoated students don't go to the guidance office for counseling.

The very serious problems of those Columbine students were exacerbated by a national school system that sits passively on its hands and allows the kind of mental torture that adults wouldn't put up with for a nanosecond. If schools want to be safe, they have to create a safe environment for all students, and that means even the nerds, the goths, the D students and the geeks, not just the students they can brag about to the Board of Education.

Harris and Klebold were responsible for their actions, make no mistake. But the school system bears responsibility for creating an atmosphere that allows that kind of rage to fester and turn homicidal. Saying, and meaning, "Harrassment will not be tolerated," doesn't cost a dime, and it may save lives.

User Detail :  

Name : Laura26060, Gender : F, Race : White/Caucasian, Age : 37, City : Bel Air, State : MD Country : United States, Occupation : College English teacher, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

[Rhiannon]

When I was first reading about the Columbine shootings, I had a thought that disturbed me very much: I suddenly found myself thinking about the individuals I would have sought out to shoot if I had massacred my high school 10 years ago. Of course I never would have done this - I'm not a violent person - but it bothered me that I still have so much residual anger and pain left over from my school outcast days. I was a brainy, painfully shy loner with few social skills who was harassed until about age 16. I was incredibly lonely. Things got much better for me as an adult. I came out of my shell almost immediately in college and found friends I could really relate to. Now, I'm an emotionally healthy adult (a few bad memories aside) with many friends and a loving partner, and I'm a few months shy of a PhD.

But yes, to answer your question, the alienation of outcasts is a big problem in high schools, and anyone who's been an outcast can understand (though not condone) how a couple of kids could just snap.

User Detail :  

Name : Rhiannon, Gender : F, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Jewish, Age : 28, City : Minneapolis, State : MN Country : United States, Occupation : Media studies graduate student, 

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