http://www.kyle.cn/

I am from Denver and i was there during the whole Columbine thing. Oh my God can the media pull the heart strings of John Q. Public.

I was listening to Jim Lehrer who I really respect the other day and his program too has been whipped up into a media frenzy talking about the signs of a killer and how to predict the next one. What a waste of time.

Shit does happen and people only care when it happens in their own backyard. Millions have died in Darfur, Liberia, and Rwanda and nobody gives a shit. They beg for help from the US, but no one answers the call. Why? I hope I’m wrong, but people don’t give a shit about other people.

Lastly, how many American GIs and US Mercenaries have marched into Iraqi schools and people’s homes in the last few years with guns ablazing?

Perhaps the problem is more in my lack of definition of “shit happens” and my personal feelings towards that. What you see as dismissive, and causing a large issue full of emotion to be trivial, I see as daoism.

As an armchair daoist, I truly believe that acceptance of life, in all its shades, is the best way to travel through it. It’s not trivializing, nor is it aggrandizing. It just is.

As for the CNN thing… it wasn’t a personal attack, more just making a statement of how the media is using this tragedy (as it does with every tragedy) to sell shit.

Yeah, we all dismiss most of the things we hear about, but I think it’s important to remember that they really do matter. Just because we don’t have the psychic capacity to sympathize with all the suffering in the world doesn’t mean that it’s not important.

And by the way, I don’t like the implication that I’m crying because the media tells me to. I don’t even watch CNN.

so, it turns out he was korean. or should that be korean-american?

today’s South China Morning Post, which i read in the hotel in HK this morning, had a history of US Uni gun rampages dating back to the 1960’s. Actually, in 1991, a young Chinese student did kill a few people after missing out on an academic award. So, sadly, there was a precedent. But a pity that some parts of the US press jumped to conclusions.

the Virginia Tech area seems close-knit, and its mixed population is part of its strength, so hopefully the korean community - or overseas students in general - will not become ostracized in the US.

However, I refuse to let an isolated incident, that happens to make good headlines, dictate how I feel towards the planet. I refuse to swallow how the government, media, and various NGOs are going to twist this situation to suit their multitude of agendas. All with an empathetic ornateness painting my face and swelling my soul.

And you’re damn right it’s dismissive. Just as dismissive as I am towards the hurt and pain in this world any other day. Cry for these kids today because protocol, a big heart and CNN tell you to, but were you crying for all the others the day before?

It’s a tragedy, no doubt, but life is - for all but the lucky few.

Shit happens, but it doesn’t always have to happen, and in this case, certainly could have been avoided if Virginia had tighter gun control laws. Virginia is one of the most lenient states in the U.S. in this respect, and it’s completely insane.

Shit happens, but expressing it that way really is insensitive, and dismissive of other people’s pain. A moment’s reflection on the pain of twenty or thirty pairs of parents, of college students in the prime of their lives, should drive home the magnitude of this tragedy.

Now, I realize that comes off as completely insensitive and I don’t mean it as such, so give me a second to explain.

The thing is, people get killed, as often as not, by other people. This has been happening for… well, at least as long as I’ve been alive, and I’ve a few History Channel specials that seem to indicate longer.

Maybe tighter gun laws, better brain screens or a bit more love as a child would have stopped this tragedy, but maybe not. People kill people. Things kill things. It’s cold, it’s brutal, but unlike most tits in Hollywood, it’s 100% natural.

Obviously the closer to home these things happen, the more it makes us want to do things to stop it (how many of us have thought much about the 200,000 people who’ve been slaughtered - at least as brutally as the VA Tech kids - in Darfur?). The truth us, shit like this is always going to happen. We’re always going to feel helpless and scared that it could happen to us, and in turn we’re always going to react by trying to find a simple solution or cause to solve it or at least explain it.

In the end: Life can be a big pile of shit, so best to enjoy it if you can.