What's Left Out about Cho Seung-Hui

Since the killings at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in Blacksburg, Virginia, by Cho Seung-Hui have been on TV for almost a week now, I have more questions:

1. Who was financing Cho Seung-Hui's college education?

2. Where did Cho Seung-Hui get the money to buy those guns and ammunition and target practice?

3. Was anyone monitoring his activities?

If Cho Seung-Hui had a job or savings to pay for his purchases, then I can see how he could do it without many people knowing about them. But, if he was charging the purchases and someone else was paying for them, then why didn't that person question the use of those purchases?

Once again, what's left out of the stories is very important for learning how these tragedies could have been prevented.

Gun Control & Protection

The massacre at Virginia Polytechnic on Monday has many people talking about the need for more gun control. Obviously, without guns, people would not get killed with guns. But they would be killed with other means, such as explosives, knives, bats, sticks, steel pipes, chemicals, string, wire, tape, hands – you get the idea. So, therefore, the real need is for PROTECTION.

Some people say that, if the police had all the weapons (usually guns), other people wouldn’t need them to protect themselves. But can we rely on police protection? A number of court decisions have been made that say that police have NO OBLIGATION to protect you. (Source: http://hematite.com/dragon/policeprot.html) Their job is to investigate and to apprehend ... after the fact. So where does that leave us? ... Sleep well.

April Tragedy

Another tragedy occurred in America on Monday, April 16, 2007. THIRTY-TWO people at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in Blacksburg, Virginia, were killed by South Korean national Cho Seung-hui. He first killed two students at a dormitory around 7:15AM. The university should have been put on alert, but it wasn’t. At least the instructors should have been notified, but they weren’t. Those in charge should have assumed that the killer was roaming the campus, but they didn’t… But then, we’re so used to killings these days... especially when we don’t really know the victims.

Around 9AM the killer reportedly chained the door to Norris Hall to prevent people from leaving. Where did he get the chain and the lock? How long could this have taken? He then killed THIRTY more people.

Could this have been prevented? WHAT IF people had done things differently than they did?

An instructor had had him removed from her class because of his violence-laden writings and complaints from other students of being afraid of him. Even his private instructor said that she was afraid of him, to the point that she had a code word to get help. Why weren’t his writings scrutinized more? Why wasn’t any more action taken? Why wasn’t he required to have a psychological examination? Oh, I know: that would violate his entitlement to express his views in any way that he wants. That’s true, as far as the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution goes. But – and this is the “But” that can get you – he didn’t have that right on everyone’s property. If this had been a private school, he might have been removed – unless the “entitlement police” intervened.

If his writings had just been taken more seriously… But then we might have to criticize the junk that’s been coming out of Hollywood (etc.) for decades. Look at the shows on TV and most movies. What do you see? Killing, killing, and more killing. When are people going to stop glorifying it?