Virginia Tech University Massacre

how do i describe how fortunate i am to have been a canadian? school shootings are extremely rare in canada. for us canadians, it is nearly impossible to even see a gun in a store, not to mention to be able to purchase one. however, it is a totally different story in the united states. recently, a senior student from virginia tech was able to get his hands on guns and shot thirty two innocent human beings like he was a pro with previous training. if this is not the time to really fix the gun ownership policy, when would it ever be?

i was watching a video clip of a news interviewed conducted by ctv and the criminologists discussed how they could prevent such tragic stories from happening in the future. based on their arguments, i believe that there are many constructive policies that could and should be implemented to stop such crimes from taking places again. however, everything comes with a price, and in this case, the price is personal privacy.

apparently, many people saw warning signs in the shooter cho seung-hui long ago. for example, one of his teachers read some of his writings where he wrote about disturbing stories and scenes about murders, violence, revenge, and so on. the teacher reported to the school, but not the place or the authority, about how this boy needed counselling. he never saw a counsellor, however, and no one kept pressing the button. it was too bad. also, other students pointed out that cho had an imaginary girlfriend and often stalked people. these were all very obvious signs, and yet nothing was done to fix the problems.

what if the teacher had reported to the police? of course, that would have been against the law. cho couldn't have been arrested without committing any crime. it looked like the cops would have to wait until he really committed one and shot thirty two innocent people, eh? we should change this system. whenever a citizen has any suspicious behaviour or disturbing thoughts, the authority should be given the right to monitor him/her. no arrests should be necessary, but at least some sort of surveillance would be helpful, in my opinion. in this case, for example, the police could have kept track of cho's behaviours and would have been able to detect immediately after cho purchased the guns. cho also wrote threatening letters before the shooting. the police would have been able to pick that up if cho's teacher and classmates had been allowed to file reports.

i understand that this deals with privacy issues, but is it really worth it to sacrifice thirty two innocent lives over one criminal? think about that. don't let those young students and the brave professors pass away for nothing. their deaths should serve us as a warning sign. these stories aren't just "stories". they are straight-up real in our faces. the victim could have been you and me if we had been in a different place and a different time!